He's being hailed as a civil rights hero by liberal Democrats for leading the successful drive to repeal the ban on gay men and lesbians serving openly in the military.
But Sen. Joseph Lieberman's record on another matter of great importance to gays and lesbians -- the right to legally marry -- is decidedly more mixed.
Back in 2009, the Connecticut-based civil rights group Love Makes a Family surveyed members of the state's Congressional delegation on the federal Defense of Marriage Act. Lieberman voted in support of DOMA in 1996 and, when asked by Love Makes a Family 13 years later, his stance hadn't changed.
"DOMA makes clear that marriage under federal law is a status that should be attainable only by one man and one woman,'' Lieberman's office said in a statement released by Love Makes a Family.
But, the statement added, "[a]ny State's decision to define marriage otherwise, such as his own state of Connecticut which he respects, should not effect the definition of marriage under either federal law or the laws of other states.''