Here’s the scoop and this is why it affects all of us:

The House Republican leadership’s bill for its legal defense of DOMA is on the rise. In a modified contract approved Friday, the GOP-led House Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG) agreed to pay Washington, D.C.-based firm Bancroft PLLC up to $1.5 million for ongoing Defense of Marriage Act litigation.

The $1.5 million cap is triple the amount specified in the original April contract — the veracity of which Democratic leaders had questioned, given the volume of DOMA litigation nationwide.

On Tuesday, a spokesman for House Democratic minority leader Nancy Pelosi said: “At a time when Americans are hurting and job creation should be the top priority, it just shows how out of touch House Republicans have become that they would spend up to $1.5 million dollars to defend discrimination in our country.”

In short, here’s the scoop: DOMA is the Defense of Marriage Act, which says that no state may be required to recognize as a marriage a same-sex relationship considered a marriage in another state. DOMA is being challenged, and the House Republicans have tripled the budget that goes toward funding it’s defense. This budget comes from taxpayer money. Basically, as a taxpaying gay man, I’m giving the government money to defend it’s stance of discrimination against gay men.

THIS. MUST. STOP.