FILE - In this Nov.. 7, 2018 file photo, then Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch speaks at an election night event in Pewaukee, Wis. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File)

In a move disparaged by his long-time anti-LGBTQ opponents, Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers (D) raised a Progress Pride Flag over the state Capitol on June 1 in Madison, signaling the start of this year’s Pride Month. “Tony Evers is more interested in flags than he is in solving any of the problems of his creation,” GOP candidate Tim Michels said in a statement, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

While Michels stopped short of declaring whether he would continue the tradition, one of his primary contenders, former Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, made it clear: If elected, she would end the tradition.

“Rebecca will not use flags over the Capitol as political props,” campaign spokesperson Alec Zimmerman said in a statement quoted by the Journal Sentinel.

Kleefisch and Michels attitudes are hardly surprising; both have long histories of being at odds with the LGBTQ community.

In a clip published to YouTube in 2010, when Kleefisch was running with Scott Walker for her first term as lieutenant governor, a presenter on Real Milwaukee pressed Kleefisch for her personal feelings on gay marriage.

“I am against gay marriage,” she says, before pivoting to the state budget.

“When it comes to a $3 billion budget that is climbing. The Legislative Fiscal Bureau announced about five days ago that we are actually $265 million further in the hole than what we expected to be at this point. We just don’t have the money to be giving out for extra benefits right now.”

Legalizing gay marriage would have been, “a fiscal backbreaker,” she said.

The spinal health of the state budget wasn’t all Kleefisch was watching out for.

In an early 2010 interview with a conservative radio station, she expressed her concern about the effect recognizing same-sex domestic partnerships would have on pets and household furniture.

While Wisconsin still had a state ban on same-sex marriage in 2010, a domestic partnership registry that opened in 2009 enabled same-sex couples to access some expanded legal rights.

The registry was “a slippery slope,” according to Kleefisch. “At what point are we going to OK marrying inanimate objects? Can I marry this table or this, you know, clock? Can we marry dogs?” an archived version of a Journal Sentinel article reported.

In a subsequent apology, she said her comments were meant to “relay my concern with redefining marriage.” Kleefisch claimed she didn’t mean to sound insensitive and that she has the upmost respect for all people.

During a 2004 debate between Michels and then-Sen. Russ Feingold (D), while legislation to amend the state constitution to explicitly prohibit same-sex marriage was still working its way through the government, an audience member asked the candidates, “How will each of you protect the rights of gay and lesbian Wisconsin residents?”

Michels said, “Every American, regardless of skin color, religious preference, or sexual orientation, deserves to be treated as an American. But I think when you bring it out of your house and onto the public street, that’s where I differ.”

He said he believed in traditional family values and “if necessary, I’ll support a constitutional amendment that will keep marriage between a man and a woman. It’s been that way for thousands of years. And I think the sanctity of marriage is worth protecting.”

Today, both Michels and Kleefisch continue to stand against the LGBTQ issue of the hour.

During an appearance on The Vicki McKenna Show in April, the host asked Michels what he would do as governor for parents who “do not want their children indoctrinated with deviant gender ideology.”

“A lot of this stuff, it just makes no sense to me,” he said. “You shouldn’t have a boy, someone with XY chromosomes, that can declare themselves a girl and take a couple of hormone pills and then compete against them. That’s not fair. That doesn’t make sense to me.”

While minimal data is available on exactly how many trans women compete in women’s sports at the high school or collegiate levels, the Associated Press reported last year that lawmakers can are almost universally unable to cite examples of trans youth’s participation causing problems or giving an unfair advantage.

Additionally, the process of transitioning genders is vastly more involved and nuanced than taking “a couple hormone pills,” as suggested Michels.

Not to be left off the anti-transgender youth train, Kleefisch said on an April episode of The Regular Joe Show that banning gender affirming surgeries and hormone blockers for minors “makes sense to me.”