Wants HB2 Repealed, Says North Carolina Is ‘Hemorrhaging’ Jobs, and ‘Y’all Means Everyone’
Democratic State Rep. Billy Richardson warns North Carolina is rapidly losing jobs and regrets his vote for HB2, an anti-LGBT law that Republican Gov. Pat McCrory signed last month. Richardson says “we’re hemorrhaging jobs and we have lost credibility in this nation. In North Carolina, y’all means everyone,” he told Chuck Todd Friday on “Meet the Press Daily.”Â
“I have legislation drafted that I will introduce in the short session,” Rep. Richardson said. “What my legislation would do is re-establish our courts as a means of redress.” He adds that his bill “expands out anti-discrimination laws to the LGBT community, and to veterans and to service members.”
Richardson did not say today if his bill repeals HB2, nor did he mention any other specifics. An email to Rep. Richardson did not receive a response before this article’s publication.
But in a Wednesday press release Richardson says his “legislation would expand statewide non-discrimination protections on the basis of religion, race, color, national origin, age, disability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, military service, and veteran status.”
And earlier this week Richardson penned an op-ed, writing, “I call on my fellow legislators, the speaker, the president pro tem and the governor to repeal this hurtful, overreaching and unnecessary law.”
“By enacting House Bill 2, the legislature did the wrong thing. I made the wrong vote and we must now make it right,” he wrote, acknowledging his support at the time for HB2.
“I will not be silent and allow North Carolina’s values to be undermined by the travesty that is HB2,” he concluded.Â
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