Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, arrives at Trump Tower in Trump Tower in New York City on November 18, 2016. On Thursday, Huckabee resigned from the Country Music Association Board after only one day. File Photo by John Taggart/UPI |
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March 2 (UPI) -- Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee resigned from the Board of the Country Music Association Thursday after only one day due to controversy over his appointment.
The appointment of Huckabee, a conservative Republican who ran for president on a conservative values platform, irked many people involved with CMA, including the LGBT community. Huckabee is staunchly against gay marriage and once said the Supreme Court's 2014 decision to allow gay marriage in all states was "judicial tyranny."
In his resignation letter, Huckabee expressed his regret that he wouldn't be able to continue the unpaid position as a CMA Board member to expand music education to kids across the United States and said many of the complaints against him were false and used to attack him for his religious views.
lamented that political opinions are sometimes expressed in the arts community.
"Until recently, the arts was the one place America could set aside political, geographical, racial, religious, and economic barriers and come together," he said. "If the arts community becomes part of the polarization instead of bridging communities and people over the power of civil norms as reflected in the arts, then we as a civilization may not be long for this earth."
Huckabee also addressed complaints that he was against public education.
"I am the PRODUCT of public education," he wrote. "As Governor my own children were the first children of a Governor in 50 years to have their entire education grades 1-12 in the PUBLIC schools of Arkansas. I fought to give teachers the largest pay raise in state history. I successfully led the effort to allow teachers to retire with full benefits after 28 years of service after my two Democrat predecessors vetoed the same bill."
He added: "I personally shepherded through legislation that mandated both music AND arts programs for EVERY student in grades 1-12 and taught by fully certified teachers. We were one of the only states to have ever done that."
In a tweet Thursday night, Huckabee made a subtle joke about his brief time on the CMA Board.
"Got home from 28 hour trip from Taipei that lasted longer than my time on CMA Foundation board," he wrote.
