Virginia Foxx sends apology to Matthew Shepard's mother

Last week U.S. Rep. Virginia Foxx stood on the House floor and called the case behind Matthew Shepard's 1998 murder "a hoax." A short time later she wrote a letter apologizing for the comment to Shepard's mother.

Foxx's comments came during debate on a hate-crimes bill that bore the name of Shepard, who was brutally attacked in Wyoming and left hanging on a fence to die. Foxx said he was killed during a robbery, not because he was gay.

Judy Shepard was in the House gallery when Foxx made her comments.

In an interview with a Winston-Salem TV station, Foxx said she "simply chose a poor word."

According to today's Winston-Salem Journal, she said she sent a handwritten note to Shepard's mother. She told the station, "if I said anything that offended her, I certainly apologize for it and know that she's hurting, and I would never do anything to add to that."

The paper said the Matthew Shepard Foundation confirmed that Judy Shepard received Foxx's note, but declined to comment.

"We are not commenting any further on Rep. Foxx's remarks on the House floor, or anything that was contained in a letter," Logan Shepard, the foundation's communications associate, told the paper. "Everything that has been said already, is enough. We are trying to focus on the positive, which is, that the (hate-crimes bill) has been passed onto the Senate."

Virginia Foxx calls Shepard case a "hoax'

As the U.S. House debated a hate crimes bill today, Rep. Virginia Foxx today called the case for which it's named "a hoax."

The House was poised to vote on the so-called Matthew Shepard bill, named for a 21-year-old gay man murdered in Wyoming in 1998. Supporters say he was the victim of a hate crime perpetrated because he was gay.

"The hate crimes bill that's called the Matthew Shepard bill is named after a very unfortunate incident that happened where a young man was killed," Foxx, a Banner Elk Republican, said on the House floor. "But we know that that young man was killed in the commitment of a robbery. It wasn't because he was gay. This -- the bill was named for him, hate crimes bill was named for him, but it's really a hoax that that continues to be used as an excuse for passing these bills."

Foxx's comments -- and reaction to them --- spread across the Internet.

"She should be ashamed," Democratic Rep. John Lewis of Georgia told a reporter. "That is unreal, unbelievable. The law enforcement people and almost every reasonable person I know believes he was murdered because he was gay."

A spokesman later said Foxx used "a poor choice of words."

Shepard was killed after meeting two men in a Laramie, Wyoming bar. The two were later convicted. Some witnesses testified that Shepard was targeted because he was gay.

"The facts over the last decade ... more than speak for themselves," said Matt Comer, an organizer with Charlotte Rainbow Action Network for Equality. "Now she is trying to go back rewrite history, dishonor the life of Matthew Shepard. We cannot forget about the hate that is involved in crimes like this."