May 2016 Church & State - May 2015

Groups Challenge N.C. Law That Will Restrict Rights Of LGBT Residents

  AU admin

A coalition of organizations is challenging a new North Carolina law that overturns local anti-discrimination ordinances and requires people to use a bathroom that corresponds to their biological gender.

The American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, Equality North Carolina and Lambda Legal filed suit in March on behalf of Joaquín Carcaño, a transgender man and public health expert at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill; Payton Grey McGarry, a transgender man and student at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro and Angela Gilmore, a lesbian and North Carolina Central University’s associate dean for academic affairs. 

The lawsuit charges that the rapid process used to pass the measure was “rife with procedural irregularities.”

“[T]he legislature introduced and passed H.B. 2 in a matter of hours, and the governor signed the bill into law that same day,” the lawsuit claims. “Lawmakers made no attempt to cloak their actions in a veneer of neutrality, instead openly and virulently attacking transgender people, who were falsely portrayed as predatory and dangerous to others.”

The suit, Carcaño v. McCrory, also states that the law is blatantly unconstitutional because it violates equal protection rights.

BREAKING NEWS

Americans United & the National Women’s Law Center file suit to challenge Missouri’s abortion bans.

Abortion bans violate the separation of church and state. Americans United and the National Women’s Law Center—the leading experts in religious freedom and gender justice—have joined forces with thirteen clergy from six faith traditions to challenge Missouri’s abortion bans as unconstitutionally imposing one narrow religious doctrine on everyone.


Join the Fight and Donate Today