University can’t enforce transgender loo restrictions, North Carolina judge rules

UNIVERSITIES in North Carolina must allow two transgender students and one employee to use lavatories matching their gender identity, an American judge has ruled.

However, most transgender people will still be bound by the law adopted by the state’s Republican governor in March that requires them to use lavatories in government buildings and schools that match the sex on their birth certificate.

Bathroom access has become a flashpoint in the battle over transgender rights in the United States. The controversial North Carolina law has led to boycotts of the state by corporations, entertainers and the National Basketball Association, which has moved its 2017 All-Star Game from Charlotte.

Thomas Schroeder, a US District Court judge, said on Friday that the three plaintiffs challenging the measure were likely to succeed at trial on their claim that it violates the 1972 Title IX Act, which prohibits sex-based discrimination by schools receiving federal funding.

“The individual transgender plaintiffs have clearly shown that they will suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief,” he wrote. He noted that single-occupant lavatories were generally unavailable at the University of North Carolina.

The judge said his order effectively returned those involved to the status quo before the law passed, when the lavatory choices of transgender individuals were considered on a case-by-case basis, “rather than applying a blanket rule to all people in all facilities under all circumstances”.

About 0.6 per cent of US adults identify as transgender, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law. Debates about which public lavatory facilities they and transgender children should use have divided courts, state legislatures and schools.

Chris Brook, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, said the latest ruling means the students and university employee who sued the state will no longer face the humiliation of being banned from using bathrooms aligned with their gender identity.

Mr Brook said the judge’s legal analysis indicated that he was likely to block the law in its entirety once the full case is heard in a trial set for November.

Lawyers for Governor Pat McCrory, and other Republican officials who support the law, said it protected residents’ privacy and safety, even though it included no specific enforcement.