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events from Indiana the previous year when a similar bill passed there). He later met with analysts to talk about scaling back operations in Atlanta as well, where the company employs several hundred people. And Benioff and state Sen. Josh McKoon (R-Columbus) faced off on Twitter in the days that followed.

On Feb. 26, the New York Times editorial board jumped into the fray, calling the bill “nothing more than a legal shield for discrimination.” Business leaders nationwide noticed, and many, including Dell founder and CEO Michael Dell, retweeted it. Virgin Group founder Richard Branson, Unilever CEO Paul Polman and Microsoft President Brad Smith piled on from there.

Things snowballed from there, with Disney, Marvel, The Weinstein Company, Fox, Viacom, AMC, Starz, Lionsgate, Time Warner, CBS, NBCUniversal, Discovery and MGM all vowing to pull up stakes in Georgia if the bill passed, which would have been a major blow to the state’s constantly growing film and television industries.

The negative economic impact the bill could bring the state was quite likely the most influential argument against passing it.

LGBT and Democratic Lawmakers … Plus a Few Republicans

LGBT state Reps. Karla Drenner (D-Avondale Estates), Keisha Waites (D-Atlanta) and Park Cannon (D-Atlanta) weren’t the only ones under the Gold Dome standing up against HB 757. They were joined throughout the fight by allies like state Sens. Vincent Fort (D-Atlanta), Elena Parent (D-Atlanta) and Nan Orrock (D-Atlanta), and state Reps. Taylor Bennett (D-Brookhaven) and Dee Dawkins-Haigler (D-Lithonia).

And while the vast majority of Republicans supported the bill, there were detractors within the GOP, starting with Georgia Prospers leader Ronnie Chance.

Former Georgia Attorney General, federal prosecutor and US Justice Department official Joe Whitley submitted an analysis of the bill to Deal and House Speaker David Ralston on Feb. 25 saying it permits discrimination and denies equal protection of the laws and that the bill “would lead to real harm to many people.”

And 11 Republicans in the House voted against the bill in its final form.

But of course there was one more Republican whose voice that carried the most weight in the fate of the bill.

Gov. Nathan Deal

If anyone who supported HB 757 was surprised that Gov. Nathan Deal ended up vetoing it, they shouldn’t have been. Deal made public comments on Feb. 29 warning lawmakers away, not only from discriminatory legislation, but any legislation that could be “perceived as discrimination.” Several days later he said he would reject any bill that “allows discrimination in our state in order to protect people of faith” and called on his fellow Republicans to “recognize that the world is changing around us.”

In comments in early March, Deal gave a teaser for the biblical argument against discrimination he ended up making when announcing his veto. Those comments drew a swarm of criticism from the religious right, with the anti-LGBT Family Research Council, the Southern Baptist Convention, the Georgia Baptist Mission Board and others bashing the governor (a Southern Baptist) in the following days.

Not to be forgotten: Deal’s comments laid out a roadmap for Republicans who wanted to come out against the bill but needed political – or in this case, biblical – cover to do so. However, it wasn’t enough to keep the bill from passing in the Senate on March 16 and hitting the governor’s desk for his signature.

It would take another 12 days for Deal to announce his decision: veto.

Community leaders, faith leaders, business leaders and political leaders can only do so much. But the fight gets taken to another level with the support of the masses. And the LGBT community and the community’s allies made their voices heard in a big way.

All of those LGBT rights groups wouldn’t have had anything to drop at the governor’s desk if those 75,000 emails and letters weren’t sent in. Tying up phone lines and inundating voicemail boxes with calls to legislators sticks out.

Political leaders wanting to (and wanting fellow legislators to) vote against the bill would have had an infinitely tougher time making their case if they looked out the window of the Capitol and saw only a handful of people rallying against it in Liberty Plaza – instead of the hundreds and hundreds who actually did show up.

Business leaders likely would not have stepped out in opposition to the bill if they hadn’t heard from so many of their employees concerned about its effects.

Faith leaders answer to a higher power, but they also couldn’t ignore the faces in front of them in their various congregations and temples.

And having the will of the people behind you is a good reason for a governor to veto a bill.

HB 757 isn’t the first and it won’t be the last effort to strip Georgia’s LGBT community of its rights. What remains to be seen is if that massive effort against it can be duplicated in the future.

December 23, 2016