Robert Gerald Marshall (born May 3, 1944) is an American businessman, author and former politician, who was a Republican member of the Virginia House of Delegates representing the 13th District.

[2][3] In 2008, Marshall ran for the United States Senate seat being vacated by John Warner,[4] but he finished second to Jim Gilmore by 66 votes out of over 10,000 cast at the Republican convention.

Before election to the Virginia House of Delegates in 1991, Marshall was a staffer for the American Life League, an organization which opposes all forms of abortion and birth control.

[18] In September 2007, Marshall introduced a resolution "of no confidence in the policies of the current House of Delegates Republican Leadership as pursued from 2002 to the present".

[20] In 1989, when Marshall was working as the research director of the American Life League, he told The Boston Globe that he opposes all forms of abortion and birth control that take effect after conception.

During the 2012 legislative session, Marshall and other Republicans supported a measure (SB484/HB462) to require women in Virginia to undergo a trans-vaginal ultrasound procedure before being allowed to have a legal abortion.

[24][25] Public protests about this invasive procedure caused Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell to withdraw his support for the bill.

[30]McDonnell also criticized Marshall, saying on Washington area radio station WTOP that his comments were "poor and offensive and wrong", and that "we should do everything we can for young children who are disabled and provide the best safety net we can".

Marshall wrote a letter to Jeffrey M. Lacker, president of the bank, urging him to take down the flag, claiming that homosexuality "adds significantly to illness, increases health costs, promotes venereal diseases, and worsens the population imbalance relating to the number of workers supporting the beneficiaries of America’s Social Security and Medicare programs.

In May 2012, Marshall led a successful effort to defeat the nomination of openly gay prosecutor Tracy Thorne-Begland to a district court judgeship, who was supported by both the governor and a bipartisan judicial committee.

In response to the confirmation, Marshall said, "The members who switched are going to have a hard time explaining this to the Republican base...The conservatives are not going to be very pleased about this.

[37][38] In January 2015, Marshall introduced Virginia House Bill 1414 which would enable refusal of service to persons based on same-sex marriage or homosexual behavior by any public or private business in some way licensed by the state.

[48][49][50] With the ratification of the amendment, Section 15-A was added to Article I, stating "[t]hat only a union between one man and one woman may be a marriage valid in or recognized by this Commonwealth and its political subdivisions.

"[51] Speaking before an anti-abortion group in 2013, Marshall criticized the 2013 Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy's majority opinion which ruled the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional.

"[32] In 2014, Judge Arenda Wright Allen ruled in Bostic v. Schaefer the relevant laws passed in 1997, 2004, and 2006 prohibiting same-sex marriage in Virginia were unconstitutional.

"[56] The Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union wrote a letter to Marshall stating that "any attempt to exclude service members from the National Guard would be unconstitutional and ill-advised, and would certainly face a federal court challenge," and urging him to withdraw the bill.

"[62] After the bill passed over his objections, Marshall led an effort in conjunction with elected officials in Loudoun County, Virginia to have it overturned by the courts.

Article 7, Section 7 of the Constitution of Virginia states: "No ordinance or resolution... imposing taxes, or authorizing the borrowing of money shall be passed except by a recorded affirmative vote of a majority of all members elected to the governing body.

One newspaper describe the effect of the ruling as "hitting the General Assembly like a bomb", and the director of the Hampton Roads Regional Transportation Authority characterized the decision as "nuclear".

[66] Marshall introduced the "Physical Privacy Act" (HB 1612), a bill to restrict bathroom and changing facility use by transgender people in January 2017.

[4][72] After months of speculation, on January 12, 2012, Marshall confirmed that he would enter the race for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate seat held by the retiring Jim Webb.

[73] He formally announced his candidacy on January 16, 2012, emailing supporters saying, "I can beat Tim Kaine," the presumptive Democratic nominee for the seat.