HB2 Will Cost NC
posted by Misha Thomas | May 4, 2016 | In OpinionHouse Bill 2 or HB2 is a law enacted to prevent cities and countries from passing what some may consider their own anti-discrimination rules. This was signed by NC legislators March 24, 2016. Along with North Carolina, Georgia was considering a bill that protects small business and allows them the option to not serve or help gay weddings or customers due to religious beliefs. Because of this, companies such as Disney Studios, Wells Fargo and Bank of America threatened to pull out of Atlanta. Under pressure, Gov. Nathan Deal decided not to sign the bill into law.
Since the NC bill was signed, the mayors of cities such as San Francisco, Seattle and New York City, along with the governor of New York, banned publicly funded employee travel to North Carolina in response to the law. For that past few years, Americans have witnessed first-hand a clash of rights, religious beliefs, the LGBT community and politics.
According to the Department of Education, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 forbids discrimination against transgender students in any school that receives federal funding. These schools are prohibited from excluding transgender students from the bathroom consistent with their gender identity. That jeopardizes the more than $4.5 billion in federal education funding that North Carolina expected to receive in 2016. Without that money, many schools in the state—from kindergarten through college—will be unable to function. From a strictly financial standpoint, this hurts the income of North Carolinians across the state. We risk losing over $4 billion in Federal Title IX funding if our non-discrimination statutes are found to be in violation of Federal law. The state will almost certainly spend over $1 million in taxpayer money defending the law in court.
Furthermore, the Supreme Court in Romer v. Evans in 1996 invalidated a Colorado measure that forbade municipalities from passing gay nondiscrimination ordinances. As the court explained in the case of Romer, the Equal Protection Clause forbids a state from “singl[ing] out a certain class of citizens” and “impos[ing] a special disability upon those persons alone.” So from a legal stand point, this can be considered unconstitutional. In the House, every Republican and 11 Democrats backed the bill. In the Senate, Democrats walked out when a vote was called, resulting in a 32-0 passage by Republicans. The law not only overturns Charlotte’s ban, it also prevents any local governments from passing their own non-discrimination ordinances, mandates that students in the state’s schools use bathrooms corresponding to the gender on their birth certificate, and prevents cities from enacting minimum wages higher than the state’s.
Based on the information I have stated, HB2 has many flaws and, in my opinion, this will carry on into what may be more protests and boycotts in which North Carolina will have to make the decision to go against what they have already signed or face the scrutiny and backlash that sure enough will come.
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