NASHVILLE – The Republican-led Tennessee House voted Monday to include public restrooms, dressing rooms and locker rooms in the state’s public indecency laws, prompting warnings from Democratic critics that the state could be setting itself up for economic boycotts.
Representatives voted 69-25 for the bill, which although watered down from its original version still prompted some concerns from the LGBTQ community and others.
The House then passed two other controversial bills, one a measure that seeks to bar state funding for health care clinics that provide abortion services by declaring abortion on demand is a tenet of “secular humanism,” which the measure says is a religion.
A third bill passed by the House seeks to begin requiring smaller businesses employing between 25 and 50 workers to start using E-Verify system checks on prospective hires to ensure they are lawfully in the U.S. Current law requires the checks on employers with more than 50 workers.
All three bills are pending in the Senate.