RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) – Giving no indication of yielding to pressure, North Carolina’s Republican leaders called a federal warning about the legality of the state’s new law limiting LGBT anti-discrimination rules a broad overreach by the government.
Gov. Pat McCrory and top state legislators were determining what steps to take after the U.S. Justice Department said in a letter Wednesday that the state law violated federal civil rights laws and threatened possible litigation.
“This is no longer just a North Carolina issue, because this conclusion by the Department of Justice impacts every state,” McCrory said.
The North Carolina law, which requires transgender people to use public bathrooms that conform to the sex on their birth certificate, has been broadly condemned by gay-rights groups, businesses and entertainers, some of whom have relocated offices or canceled shows in the state. Several other states have proposed similar laws limiting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender protections in recent months.
“I thought it was a very common-sense rule, but the federal government is now saying those are discriminatory practices,” McCrory said during a Wednesday evening forum with the state’s chamber of commerce in Raleigh.