Constitutional Defense Council meets this morning on bills from same-sex marriage fight

Idaho’s Constitutional Defense Council meets this morning to consider two items: Payment of $401,663 in attorney fees and court costs to the winning side in the same-sex marriage case, per a U.S. District Court order; and payment of $55,000 in fees to outside attorneys that Gov. Butch Otter hired to help him with appealing the court decision to the 9 ^th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court. The council, which consists of the governor, the attorney general, the House speaker and the Senate president pro-tem, oversees the constitutional defense fund, which has a balance of nearly $1.7 million after lawmakers agreed to transfer another $1 million into it last year from the state’s general fund.