A fundraising gala planned for Saturday, December 3 in San Francisco for Tennessee Congressman Harold Ford Jr.'s U.S. Senate campaign has been postponed, according to Tammy Paster of Bay Area Dems, the group that organized the event.

No new date has been announced.

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom withdrew his support for the gala and urged Ford to cancel it after he learned that Ford was among a minority of congressional Democrats last year who voted in support of a failed amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would ban same-sex marriage. Newsom spokeswoman Jennifer Petrucione told the Bay Area Reporter on Monday, November 28, that her office has not heard anything definitive from Ford's office.

Ford's campaign press secretary, Adora Andy, did not respond to the B.A.R.'s repeated phone calls.

Newsom, San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris, and former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown were prominently listed at the top of the gala invitation to the event as honorary co-chairpersons.

"The DA was unaware of his position and she completely disagrees with it," Bilen Mesfin, a Harris spokeswoman, told the B.A.R . last week. "She has been and will continue to be a fighter for equal rights for all Californians. It is my understanding that the event is no longer happening and she will not be attending."

Brown did not return the B.A.R.'s call seeking comment.

Reporter Oliver Staley of the Commercial Appeal newspaper in Memphis told the B.A.R . that he spoke with Ford about the event on Tuesday, November 29. He said that Ford told him that he decided to postpone the fundraiser out of sensitivity to the political concerns in San Francisco. No future date has been set for the fundraiser, Staley said.

Ford said in a telephone interview with the paper, "It came to my attention that there were a few people in San Francisco concerned about my opposition to gay marriages. Out of concern for local politicians, we decided to push the event back to mid-January."

The gala was scheduled to be held at the Bubble Lounge nightclub. General manager Jane Kim told the B.A.R . that she was first notified of the cancellation through a message that was left on her voicemail over the weekend. Kim said that she learned of Ford's stand on gay rights by reading the article about the controversy in last week's B.A.R. She said that she would be very reluctant to make the Bubble Lounge available for a future Ford fundraiser because of his position on gay rights.