Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has made good on his pledge to veto several high-profile bills from Democratic legislators, including the hot-button issue of same sex marriage.

The governor’s office announced today the vetoing of 52 bills, including AB 849 by Assemblymember Mark Leno (D-SF) to remove references to gender in a portion of state law dealing with marriage.

Schwarzenegger’s rationale– that the bill conflicts with the anti-gay marriage Proposition 22– has been well-known for months. And in his veto message, he seemed to be sending a message that his decision was based only on that law.

“I believe that lesbian and gay couples are entitled to full protection under the law and should not be discriminated against based upon their relationships,” he wrote. “I support current domestic partnership rights and will continue to vigorously defend and enforce these rights and as such will not support any rollback.”

And to seemingly back that up, the veto announcement was paired with news that Schwarzenegger signed two bills that focus on domestic partnership rights, SB 565 (Migden) and SB 973 (Kuehl).

The governor also vetoed AB 48 (Lieber) to raise the minimum wage by $1 over 2 years; AB 73 (Frommer) to create a state website listing cheap prescription drugs outside the U.S.; and AB 13 (Goldberg) to ban racial mascots at public schools.

And Schwarzenegger scrapped SB 18 (Ortiz), a bill that would have allowed for an official state audit of the new stem cell research organization created by Proposition 71. The bill passed out of the Legislature on a bipartisan vote, but the governor maintains that the audit provisions would violate provisions in Prop 71 that protect certain information on how the new stem cell organization will conduct business. Critics maintain those protections will keep state taxpayers from fully knowing how their money will be spent.