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RALEIGH, N.C., March 30 (UPI) -- Executives of over 80 companies objected to a new North Carolina law eliminating anti-discrimination protection in a letter to the governor. The firestorm of criticism and threats of economic sanctions against the state came as hundreds of people marched Tuesday in Chapel Hill, N.C., protesting the enactment of HB2 and calling for its repeal.
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The measure, passed by the state legislature and signed into law on March 29 by Republican Gov. Pat McCrory, creates a statewide policy excluding protections based on gender identity and sexual orientation, and overrules local ordinances such as one in the city of Charlotte that provides those protections. It requires transgender people to use public restrooms of their biological sex instead of the gender with which they identify.
A letter to McCrory from the Human Rights Campaign and Equality North Carolina, two advocacy groups, was sent Tuesday and signed by over 80 corporate chief executives.
"This is not a direction in which states move when they are seeking to provide successful, thriving hubs for business and economic development," the letter reads. "We believe that HB 2 will make it far more challenging for businesses across the state to recruit and retain the nation's best and brightest workers and attract the most talented students from across the country. It will also diminish the state's draw as a destination for tourism, new businesses, and economic activity. Discrimination is wrong, and we believe it has no place in North Carolina or anywhere in our country."
Among the signatories are CEOs of Apple, Marriott, Facebook, Lyft, Levi Strauss, Yahoo, YouTube and IBM. Later Tuesday, Bank of America, whose international headquarters is in Charlotte, announced its CEO would join the list of objectors to the law. The governors of New York, Washington and Vermont, and the mayors of San Francisco, Seattle and New York City have officially banned state travel to North Carolina. A federal lawsuit was filed Monday by the American Civil Liberties Union and three other advocacy groups against the state and the University of North Carolina, on behalf of two transgender state residents.
Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, called the new law "mean-spirited."
Roy Cooper, state attorney general and a Democrat who intends to run for governor against McCrory in November, announced Tuesday he would not defend the law in court, saying, "Not only is this new law a national embarrassment, it will set North Carolina's economy back."
McCrory defended the legislation Tuesday, calling critics participants in a "vicious nationwide smear campaign" against his state and accusing them of "disregarding the facts."
"Other politicians, from the White House to mayors and City Council members and, yes, our attorney general, have initiated and promoted conflict to advance their political agenda," he said.
Nearly 1,000 people protested the new law on the streets of Chapel Hill, where the main campus of the University of North Carolina is located.
"It is our duty as the ones who are still remaining to fight and to be very loud and very vocal about the way that we are feeling," said transgender rally organizer Joie Lou. {link: Indiana faced similar criticism: "https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2015/04/02/Indiana-revises-religious-freedom-law-amid-backlash/8471428016987/?spt=sec&or=tn" target="_blank"} in 2015 after the state passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Language was added to the bill making it clear that it is not legal to discriminate in the state.
