Firms object to N.C.’s anti-bias law
RALEIGH, N.C. — Major corporations took stands Thursday against a new North Carolina law that bans anti-discrimination measures based on sexual orientation and gender identity and requires transgender people to use public bathrooms that match their birth certificates.
American Airlines, which operates its second-largest hub in Charlotte; the biotech company Biogen, which manufactures pharmaceuticals in Research Triangle Park; and payments processor PayPal, which last week announced plans to hire 400 people in Charlotte, were among the corporations condemning the new law.
“We believe no individual should be discriminated against because of gender identity or sexual orientation,” American Airlines spokesman Katie Cody said. “Laws that allow such discrimination go against our fundamental belief of equality and are bad for the economies of the state in which they are enacted.”
The Legislature called a special session Wednesday to void a Charlotte ordinance that would have enabled transgender people to legally use restrooms aligned with their gender identities, and would have provided broad protections against discrimination in public accommodations in the state’s largest city.
The new law now prevents the state’s cities and counties from passing their own anti-discrimination rules, and instead imposes a statewide standard that leaves out sexual orientation and gender identity.
The new law also prohibits local governments from requiring businesses to pay workers more than the state’s minimum wage, currently set at $7.25 per hour. Republican Gov. Pat McCrory had sought a bill dealing exclusively with bathrooms, but signed it anyway.
North Carolina is the first state to require public school and university students to use only those bathrooms for the gender that matches their birth certificates, according to the National Conference on State Legislatures.
The state law “is a clear step backwards. Sad day,” tweeted Jim Whitehurst, chief executive of Raleigh-based open-source software company Red Hat.
The NCAA, which is scheduled to hold men’s basketball tournament games in Greensboro in 2017 and Charlotte in 2018, also said it’s monitoring the situation and takes diversity into account when it chooses its event sites.
“Our commitment to the fair treatment of all individuals, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, has not changed and is at the core of our NCAA values. It is our expectation that all people will be welcomed and treated with respect in cities that host our NCAA championships and events,” the organization’s statement said.
Other businesses have voiced support for the measure McCrory signed into law late Wednesday, said Ricky Diaz, a spokesman for his re-election campaign. Diaz did not respond to a question seeking the names of the businesses that backed the governor’s decision.
Supporters say the new law protects all people from having to share bathrooms with people who make them feel unsafe. Advocates for gay, bisexual and transgender rights say it demonizes them with bogus claims about bathroom risks.
There were no immediate threats to withdraw business from the state.
Charlotte Mayor Jennifer Roberts, who pressed for the anti-discrimination ordinance, said in a statement that the General Assembly “is on the wrong side of history.”
McCrory countered that Roberts and the City Council had overreached into “the most personal of settings.”
About 200 protesters Thursday evening blocked a downtown Raleigh street in front of the state’s Executive Mansion. McCrory, a former Charlotte mayor, was not at the mansion at the time of the protest, spokesman Josh Ellis said.
Demonstrators like Alex Berkman complained that lawmakers acted quickly before Charlotte’s example could be adopted by other communities.
“The way that these things work is that one place will pass a law and then another place will pass a law and then we start to build momentum,” said Berkman, 29, of Raleigh.
The issue won’t likely go away as North Carolina’s Democratic attorney general, Roy Cooper, tries to unseat McCrory in November. On Thursday evening, state and national gayrights advocates joined about 400 people at a Raleigh church to vow to fight on when the General Assembly reconvenes next month and in November at the ballot box to elect Cooper and throw out legislators who voted for the law.
There also will be legal challenges. “We are going to court as soon as possible,” said Sarah Preston with the American Civil Liberties Union in North Carolina.
Bathroom use has proved to be a potent wedge issue for opponents of gay-rights protections around the country since Houston’s anti-discrimination law was overwhelmingly voted down in a referendum last year, but LGBT advocates have had some victories, too. South Dakota’s Legislature failed to override Gov. Dennis Daugaard’s veto of a bill requiring students to use bathrooms corresponding to their birth genders, and a similar bill in Tennessee bill died Tuesday.