'I'm Not Ashamed Of My Opinions'

This month, President George W. Bush is expected to announce the appointment of social conservatives and Christian activists to lead the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV and AIDS. Created by Bill Clinton in 1993, the panel helps steer White House policy on AIDS research and prevention. Bush will replace 26 of the 35 panel slots. And most of the upcoming appointees whose names were released by the White House to existing panel members late last month, are unfamiliar to AIDS policy directors, though a few have earned reputations for their contrary views on how to prevent the spread of the disease.

Several flatly oppose safe sex, a cornerstone prevention strategy throughout the AIDS epidemic, and champion measures considered anathema by civil libertarians, like mandatory testing of newborns and listing Americans with HIV infections in a common database. "The administration is giving these posts to Christian fundamentalists to appease them ... rather than trying to take the epidemic seriously," says Gay Men's Health Crisis officer Ronald Johnson. "It seems to be a patronage pool for right-wing conservatives."

To co-chair the council, Bush is expected to name two physicians who were backed by the anti-gay groups Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council: Dr. Louis Sullivan, a secretary of health and human services during the first Bush administration and Dr. Tom Coburn, a Republican congressman from Oklahoma until 2000. Both men have a track record promoting abstinence and opposing "harm reduction" AIDS prevention, such as distributing condoms to sexually active people and needles to injection drug users. But during his tenure in the House, Coburn defended other key AIDS issues, sponsoring the Ryan White CARE Act reauthorizations in 1996 and 2000 and making AIDS drug assistance a top priority. As a result, his expected appointment has been greeted with mixed reactions, with groups like AIDS Action in Washington D.C. declaring, "You can't just hate the guy."

Coburn recently spoke with NEWSWEEK's David France about his religious beliefs, his thoughts on condoms, and his ideas for the future of AIDS in America.

NEWSWEEK: Have you spoken to the President about his AIDS priorities?

Dr. Tom Coburn: I have--during the campaign, in one short meeting. But I've not spoken to him about the Presidential Advisory Council. I think he recognizes that this is a disease that affects every attribute of American society and that he would like to see it not there.