North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R), responding to a backlash against the state’s new law banning anti-discrimination protections for gay and transgender people, on Tuesday signed an executive order he said “expanded” the state’s employment policy to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
He also said he would seek legislation restoring the right to sue for discrimination. However, McCrory stopped short of altering the bill’s most high-profile provision mandating that transgender people use bathrooms that correspond only with the gender on their birth certificate.
In a videotaped message announcing the order, McCrory defended the state law as being needed to respond to what he called the “government overreach” of a Charlotte city ordinance that expanded civil rights protections for people based on sexual orientation and gender identity. He also said the issue had sparked what he called “selective outrage and hypocrisy.”
Roy Cooper, the North Carolina attorney general, and multiple LGBT groups criticized McCrory’s order as being a half-measure that left discrimination intact.
“Governor McCrory’s executive order is a day late and a veto short,” Cooper, a Democrat and McCrory’s gubernatorial opponent this fall, said in a statement. “The sweeping discrimination law he signed has already cost North Carolina hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars in revenue. I’m glad Governor McCrory has finally acknowledged the great damage his legislation has done, but he needs to do much more.”
This law prompted intense backlash from LGBT groups and big businesses alike, with a host of major companies calling on the state to withdraw its proposal. The state law prohibits transgender people from using public bathrooms in schools and government facilities that don’t match the gender on their birth certificate, and it also barred local governments from extending civil rights protections to gay and transgender people.
Two major companies — PayPal last week and, earlier on Tuesday, Deutsche Bank — announced that they would call off proposed expansions in North Carolina due to the new law.
