While GOP Strangles Transgender Rights, North Carolina Stresses Over NBA


Since the controversy over North Carolina’s transgender bathroom law started in March of 2016, the evolution of legislation has not only been the responsibility of state legislatures, but grassroots activism.

However, WBTV in North Carolina is reporting this week that the state’s legislature is re-drafting their controversial HB2 law under pressure from the National Basketball Association (NBA).

The transgender bathroom law was put front-and-center of the stage of public debate when various Republican-led states began to draft laws which required people to use public restrooms according to the gender on their birth certificate, rather than the one that person identifies with, and with North Carolina’s governor Pat McCrory leading the way.

According to the source, one of the new changes made would be to designate a certified document that allows a small transgender minority to use any public bathrooms they want.

Prior to this, there was no indication that North Carolina’s Republican-led administration would budge when they were faced with a deadline placed by the Department of Justice, over potential civil rights violations which Inquisitr reported on.

They also apparently didn’t seem to heed the pressure when businesses began to cancel their projects in the state over the HB2 bill, which are listed on a site created by the state’s Democratic Party.

Attorney General Loretta Lynch speaks during a news conference at the Justice Department in Washington, Monday, May 9, 2016. North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory’s administration sued the federal government Monday in a fight for a state law that limits protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, in the same week, and in the same week, the DOJ sued the state. [Image by Evan Vucci/AP Photo]

Inquisitr also reported on another case where pressure from the LGBT community forced a school board in North Carolina to reverse the lifting of a ban for pepper spray for students who might be assaulted in a bathroom, which many felt would be giving a free pass to those who are likely to attack transgender people.

Soon after North Carolina’s transgender law made the news, other Republican governments began to work on enforcing their own similar legislation, in order to unite against the Obama administration.

Texas government began to issue similar bills in 2015, but was spurred back into action when Fort Worth Independent School District’s superintendent Kent Scribner adopted a transgender policy for his schools in April. Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick went after Scribner in the same week as the deadline issued to North Carolina.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram published a story in May about a 16-year-old transgender student who agrees with the guidelines at a Fort Worth school she attends, which suggests that the student’s familiarity with their school allows them the chance to decide for themselves, but the argument made against Scribner is that the policy was put into play without a community vote.

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick speaks during a news conference at the Texas Republican Convention Friday, May 13, 2016, in Dallas. Texas is signaling the state it will challenge a Obama administrative directive over bathroom access for transgender students in public schools. [Image by LM Otero/AP Photo]

Since then, the Lt. Governor has demanded that the superintendent step down, but has also joined the lawsuit against the Obama administration, claiming that the president is creating a social experiment.

Further, the Lt. Governor also assigned the state’s Attorney General, Ken Paxton, to lead the lawsuit for 11-states. The Daily Signal recently interviewed Paxton.

Concerning North Carolina’s transgender bathroom bill, the legislature’s votes might cut into the weekend as they tweak the bill rather than repeal it with the new changes.

According to NBC News the NBA is saying that they’re not satisfied with the “tweaking,” as they feel the changes do not go far enough.

“The league suggested it might even pull the 2017 All-Star Game from Charlotte if a compromise did not meet its ‘guiding principles of inclusion, mutual respect and equal protections for all.'”

Thus far, it is not known how seriously North Carolina Republican lawmakers are taking the NBA over the transgender issue.

[Image by Gerry Broome/AP Photo]

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