NASHVILLE - The sponsor of a transgender student bathroom bill on Tuesday delayed consideration of the controversial measure, saying he wanted to "digest" a state attorney general's opinion that warns the bill risks a massive loss of federal education funds for Tennessee.
Meanwhile, a White House spokesman called the bill "mean-spirited," The Associated Press reported.
Earlier on Tuesday, Sen. Mike Bell, R-Riceville, told Senate Finance Committee members he wanted to delay consideration of his bill until today.
"I'm still trying to digest and understand the impact of the attorney general's opinion," he said.
In his legal opinion issued Monday, Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery said the state risks losing federal education funds for K-12 and public colleges of $1 billion or more.
Slatery said that's because the U.S. Department of Education interprets federal Title IX as requiring that transgender students be given access to restrooms and locker rooms consistent with their "gender identity," as opposed to their anatomical gender.
The bill restricts communal restrooms and locker rooms to use by students based on their designated gender at birth.
Finance Vice Chairman Bo Watson, R-Hixson, told Bell that because of the large potential impact to the state budget, the measure will have to "go behind the budget," meaning it is unfunded at this juncture and won't be considered until the end of the panel's budgetary decision-making process.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender advocates have called it a "hate" bill and likened it to similar legislation passed in North Carolina.
Four major businesses in Tennessee, including Alcoa, have warned state officials the bill threatens their recruitment of workers and could have dire consequences on efforts to recruit new businesses to the state.
Viacom, the parent company of Nashville-based CMT, which runs country music videos and country lifestyle programming, has raised objections to the bill, as well.
Supporters say the bill is intended to protect students' privacy. An amended House version makes allowances for students whose doctors say they were born with both male and female sex organs.
Speaking later, Bell told the Times Free Press he still plans to push for passage of his bill unless the committees indicate it won't hear bills that are behind the budget until later.
Bell said Slatery's comments address questions he's raised about pending litigation in other states, where federal judges in two cases have ruled against the Obama administration's interpretation of Title IX.
David Fowler, an attorney and former state senator from Signal Mountain and now head of the socially conservative Family Action Council of Tennessee, issued a blistering critique of Slatery's legal opinion, calling it "misleading" in light of what's happening elsewhere.
"It essentially regurgitates legal arguments made by the Obama administration that were flatly and unequivocally rejected by the only two courts to actually rule on them," Fowler said in a statement. "For some inexplicable reason, the attorney general does not even discuss these two cases.
"A first-year law student would get in trouble for writing a brief that ignored relevant persuasive authority as if it did not exist," Fowler said.
Bell said that is what Slatery addresses in information later sent to him.
The bill is one of a number of measures winding through state legislatures, primarily in the South, in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling last year that legalized same-sex marriage.
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest criticized Tennessee's proposed legislation, as well as similar bills in other states.
"The administration is firmly committed to promoting and defending legal rights of all Americans, including LGBT Americans," Earnest said. "Specific laws like this that seek to target and marginalize one small segment of the population [are] nothing less than mean spirited."
Earnest said states like Tennessee, and "to a certain extent North Carolina and Mississippi, have a long history over the last couple of generations of working through questions of civil rights."
He said President Barack Obama has spoken "on a number of occasions about the important progress that our country has made with regard to civil rights.
"This is a good illustration that the fight for civil rights is not over and demanding equality for every American and ensuring those Americans are not singled out or targeted because of their sex or their race or what their last name is or their religion or who they love or who they are is a struggle that continues, and the president, every time, is going to be on the side of equality and fairness and justice for every American," Earnest said.
The House companion bill is scheduled to be heard by Finance Subcommittee members today.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Contact staff writer Andy Sher at asher@timesfreepress.com, 615-255-0550 or follow via twitter at AndySher1.