Apparently the tag "LGBTALY" is too sexual for the roads of Oklahoma.
John Patrick Keefe II of Edmond applied for the vanity plate "LGBTALY" to show his support for the LGBT community, Oklahoma City news station KOCO reported. Although Keefe is heterosexual, his sister is gay and he has gay friends.
"When I am driving around with license plate that says 'LGBT ally,' it shows to other people, 'Look, I am here for my fellow Oklahomans,'” he told the network.
However, the Oklahoma Tax Commission, which approves such plates, did not approve. In December, Keefe reportedly received a letter from the commission denying his request because the phrase was "sexual in nature."
“I thought that was a load of crap. I thought that was very uneducated, very bigoted, very discriminatory against a population that has long faced an unfair, unethical discrimination,” Keefe told KWTV.
The lawyer whom Keefe hired to handle his appeal said he thinks this is an instance of the state misconstruing the term "LGBT." A spokesman for the commission told KOCO that she couldn't comment on a specific case, but said "LGBT" is not on the state's list of banned words.
Keefe, who owns C&K Global Investigations and Bail Bonds in Oklahoma City and is a certified minister performing wedding ceremonies for both straight and same-sex couples, told NewsOK that if his appeal is denied he is prepared to take the case all the way to the state Supreme Court, no matter the cost.