Financial Services Company Responds to Anti-LGBT Bill Said to Mirror North Carolina’s HB2
The CEO and president of Uphold, a South Carolina based financial services corporation, is pulling up roots and heading to Los Angeles. Anthony Watson says he has “watched in shock and dismay as legislation has been abruptly proposed or enacted in several states across the union seeking to invalidate the basic protections and rights of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) U.S. citizens.”
Watson describes himself as the “openly gay, British CEO of an American company.” He is also a board member of GLAAD.
On his company’s website he explains that recently, “we have been made aware that South Carolina Sen. Lee Bright has introduced a bill largely mirroring North Carolina’s controversial law that blocks local governments from passing LGBT-inclusive anti-discrimination ordinances. As such, we feel compelled to take action to oppose the discrimination being proposed in South Carolina and protect our LGBT employees.”
Republican Sen. Lee Bright last week introduced S. 1203, which he says mirrors North Carolina‘s anti-LGBT law HB2. In fact, it only mirrors the more-recognized portions of the law, which is also known as a “bathroom bill,” while also specifically targeting transgender students.
While introducing his new bill, Bright denounced Paypal’s opposition to HB2, saying, “PayPal has shown its support for pedophiles by wanting them to go into bathrooms.” He also said, “the silent majority is watching.”
Bright’s past proposed legislation includes a bill that would allow teachers to carry assault rifles, and a bill that would allow state employees to refuse to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
Uphold operates something like Paypal, allowing people to send and receive money. It was founded by Halsey Minor, the same man who founded tech news site CNET and co-founded Salesforce. Its website claims as of this writing to have processed $876,011,283.33 worth of transactions since 2014.
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Image via Anthony Watson/Twitter
Hat tip: Raw Story and The State
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