Proving that the problems in North Carolina did not come to an end when Republican Governor Pat McCrory was booted out of office, the far-right legislature are attempting to pass a repeal of the infamous anti-trans bill by replacing it with another bill attacking the LGBT community in an entirely different way.
Lawmakers want you to know that they are repealing HB1, the controversial “bathroom bill” which legislated who can use which public restroom, a bill which will cost the state nearly four billion dollars in the next decade.
But what they don’t want you to know is that they are replacing that horrific bill with legislation that bans any local governments from extending legal protections to LGBT populations until 2020 while also banning any bathroom-related protections on trans residents indefinitely.
What’s worse, the newly-elected Democratic governor Roy Cooper is going along with the so-called fix and recommending that the legislation be passed.
Basically, as ACLU lawyer Chase Strangio put it, “the bill makes it illegal to protect people from discrimination. And worse still, it does so under a claimed interest in protecting “bathroom safety and privacy.”
Strangio urges the American people not to be fooled by this so-called replacement law as regressive lawmakers continue to provide fewer legal protections to vulnerable populations who need it the most.
Legislators in the state cannot stand the idea that they may be providing relief and safety to a population they don’t respect. Instead, they are attempting to pass off these violations as a “fix” for the state’s major issues, a sick lie to their constituents and the rest of the nation.
Rather than recognizing that they lost billions in revenue for a legitimate reason, they are attempting to lie to their constituents instead of simply doing the right thing..
So don’t let them fool you. This replacement isn’t an improvement, it is a band-aid on the state’s bad reputation. It’s a lie, and it’s proof that so much more needs to be done to change North Carolina from the bastion of hatred and repression that it continues to be.
