A federal court has approved a settlement to North Carolina’s transgender bathroom law that allows transgender individuals to use public restrooms in accordance with the gender they identify with.
After three years of legal and legislative battles, the Tarheel state reached a settlement with the American Civil Liberties Union, Lamda Legal, and six LGBT plaintiffs. On Tuesday, U.S. Judge Thomas Schroeder signed a consent decree between Democrat Gov. Roy Cooper and the plaintiffs.
While praised by LGBT advocates, the settlement has drawn the ire of social conservatives and the Republican-controlled state legislature.
The social conservative North Carolina Values Coalition slammed the settlement, calling it a “fake compromise.” The lobbying organization blasted Democrat Governor Roy Cooper and accused him of working behind the scenes to surrender privacy rights to pro-LGBT advocacy groups such as the Human Rights Campaign and Equality NC.
“Governor Cooper’s fake settlement is actually like the fox watching the hen house,” a statement from the coalition, led by longtime activist Tami Fitzgerald, reads. “He and Attorney General [John] Stein have never stood in defense of our privacy and protection when it comes to keeping men out of women’s bathrooms, locker rooms, and showers, and now they are forcing women and girls to lose their right to privacy and safety in public facilities they control.”
The coalition argues that women and children “have an equal right to safely access public restrooms, showers and changing facilities without risking their safety or seeing men’s genitals on full display.”
In 2016, the passage of H.B. 2 effectively voided an ordinance passed by the Charlotte City Council requiring businesses to allow bathroom access on the basis of gender identity and also barred people from using bathrooms, locker rooms and changing areas consistent with their gender identity in state-owned buildings.
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SOURCE: Christian Post, Samuel Smith
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