Connect with us

UPDATING: North Carolina Governor Issues Executive Order in Response to Anti-LGBT Law Backlash

Published

on

In Video Accompanying Executive Order GOP Governor Calls Charlotte Nondiscrimination Law ‘Solution in Search of a Problem’ 

Embattled GOP Gov. Pat McCrory has just issued an executive order that appears to override a small portion of HB2, his sweeping, broad, unconstitutional law that voided all local LGBT nondiscrimination ordinances and banned transgender people from using public restrooms that conform to their gender identity.

NCRM will update this story below with reactions from legal experts as they become available.

Executive Order 93 does not change the ban on transgender people using public restrooms based on gender identity. But it states it will add sexual orientation and gender identity protections to the state’s employment policy for state employees. It also says it will seek “legislation to reinstate the right to sue in state court for discrimination.” That was taken away when he signed HB2 into law.

In the video accompanying his executive order, Gov. McCrory remains steadfast in his opposition to Charlotte’s nondiscrimination ordinance, which was voided by HB2. He called it a “solution in search of a problem,” ensuring he will stand in the doorway to continue to ban transgender people from accessing basic civil rights.

The executive order does not even mention the other sweeping changes HB2 ushered in, including stripping local control over minimum wage laws  and employment discrimination laws.

Here is the video and below, the transcript:

“Hi, I’m North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory.

North Carolina proudly welcomes all people to live, work and visit our great state.

We didn’t become the ninth most populous state in the nation by accident. We have long held traditions of both ensuring equality for all of our citizens and our visitors, while also respecting the privacy of everyone.

We are also a state that strives to allow our people and businesses to be as independent as possible without overreaching government regulations.

These North Carolina values of privacy and equality came into conflict recently when the Charlotte City Council passed a new mandate that forced on businesses a city-wide ordinance of bathroom and locker room regulations, something frankly we had never seen or had before in that great city or in North Carolina.

Simply put, this government overreach was a solution in search of a problem.

In fact, the Charlotte City Council rejected this proposal less than a year ago.

In a letter prior to the most recent vote, I notified the Charlotte City Council that this unnecessary and intrusive mandate conflicts with basic expectations of privacy in the most private of settings.

Therefore, as I expected, the state took action on what was seen as government overreach.

You know, after listening to people’s feedback for the past several weeks on this issue, I have come to the conclusion that there is a great deal of misinformation, misinterpretation, confusion, a lot of passion and frankly, selective outrage and hypocrisy, especially against the great state of North Carolina.

But based upon this feedback, I am taking action to affirm and improve the state’s commitment to privacy and equality.

To that end, today I have signed an executive order with the goal of achieving that fine balance.

This executive order accomplishes the following:

First, it maintains common sense gender-specific restroom and locker room facilities in government buildings and in our schools, and when possible, encourages reasonable accommodations for families and those who have unique or special circumstances.

Second, the private sector can make its own policy with regard to restrooms, locker rooms and/or shower facilities. This is not a government decision. This is your decision in the private sector.

Third, I have affirmed the private sector and local government’s right to establish its own non-discrimination employment policies.

And fourth, as governor, I have expanded our state equal employment opportunity policy to clarify that sexual orientation and gender identity are included.

And fifth, I will immediately seek legislation in the upcoming short session to reinstate the right to sue for discrimination in North Carolina state courts.

Simply put, I have listened to the people of North Carolina, and the people of North Carolina are entitled to both privacy and equality. We can and we must achieve both of these goals.

Now I know these actions will not totally satisfy everyone, but the vast majority of our citizens want common sense solutions to complex issues.

This is the North Carolina way.

Thank you very much, and may God continue to bless the great state of North Carolina.

UPDATE I: 3:00 PM EDT –
Buzzfeed Legal Editor Chris Geidner weighs in via Twitter:

UPDATE II: 3:03 PM EDT –
For those who want to read the actual, full legal text:

UPDATE III: 3:10 PM EDT –
Kate Kendall, head of National Center for Lesbian Rights, a national legal organization, calls it “a cynical political move.”

UPDATE IV: 3:16 PM EDT –

ACLU of North Carolina Acting Executive Director Sarah Preston:
 
“Gov. McCrory’s actions today are a poor effort to save face after his sweeping attacks on the LGBT community, and they fall far short of correcting the damage done when he signed into law the harmful House Bill 2, which stigmatizes and mandates discrimination against gay and transgender people. With this executive order, LGBT individuals still lack legal protections from discrimination, and transgender people are still explicitly targeted by being forced to use the wrong restroom.”

There’s a good deal more on their website.

ACLU National isn’t quite as generous as their local NC affiliate:

ACLU attorney and expert on HB2: 

UPDATE V: 3:33 PM EDT –
Some other opinions:

UPDATE VI: 8:08 PM EDT –

Group of US Senators Asks NBA Commissioner to Move All Star Game Out of North Carolina

 

This is a breaking news and developing story. Details may change. This story will be updated, and NCRM will likely publish follow-up stories on this news. Stay tuned and refresh for updates.

Related Topics:
Continue Reading
Click to comment
 
 

Enjoy this piece?

… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.

NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.

Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.

News

‘Makes Me Want to Throw Up’: Democrat Goes Off on Fox Host Over Signalgate Spin

Published

6 hours ago

on

March 25, 2025

By

U.S. Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) blasted a Fox News host for minimizing the potential lethal consequences to American service members that he says could have resulted from the Trump national security team’s use of Signal to plan out the recent bombing on Yemen. One of the participants of that chat was in Moscow, having visited with Russian President Putin, within hours of the 18-member chat.

Fox News host Will Cain chastised the Democrats’ anger and outrage over what is being called Signalgate, alleging it was “to score political points, the first political points they’ve been able to accomplish in two months.”

“Will,” Congressman Himes replied, “what we’re talking about here, and I’ve spent a decade now watching how our intelligence community communicates with the war fighter. So I am not going to listen to you tell me that this is about a ‘partisan advantage.'”

“It is a mistake, and yes, it’s a very serious mistake. Because if you make a mistake in Social Security and grandma doesn’t get a phone call through, that’s bad,” he said, highlighting the Trump administration’s reported targeting of the agency. “But there is not zero risk that our young men and women in uniform, the ones who flew those F-35s and F-18s—” he said before Cain cut him off.

READ MORE: ‘Putin Is Giddy’: NSA Knew Signal Was Vulnerable to Russian Hackers Before Security Breach

The Fox News host appeared to not understand how lives could have been put at risk—at one point calling it a mere “hypothetical”—and demanded Himes explain.

“Because in an insecure channel, in what was acknowledged as a mistake, before, whether it was a day or two hours or five hours, in a Signal chat that we know,” he said, “that the Russians could intercept, they might have told the Houthis in an hour, and in half an hour, they’re moving their anti-aircraft stuff around.”

“It is by the grace of God that we don’t have dead pilots or sunken ships right now,” Himes continued.

Cain claimed that the “mistake” was the accidental addition of The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg to the chat, when the larger crisis was holding what experts agree should have been a meeting in a SCIF—a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility—via Signal.

RELATED: ‘Sloppy, Careless, Incompetent’: National Security Chiefs Slammed in Senate Hearing

“Including Jeffrey Goldberg was the mistake,” Cain insisted. “You are hyperbolically taking this over the top—yes, absolutely for partisan points.”

“You are the one who is making this into a partisan issue,” Himes continued, “and we are talking about the lives of our young men and women, and it makes me want to throw up to hear you turn this into a partisan issue when we are talking about the lives of airmen and Marines and sailors.”

Cain at that point began to break into laughter.

“You just need to stop this,” Himes insisted.

Watch the video below or at this link.

RELATED: ‘Who Exactly Is Running the Government?’: Trump’s War Plans Leak Denial Backfires

 

 

Continue Reading

News

‘Putin Is Giddy’: NSA Knew Signal Was Vulnerable to Russian Hackers Before Security Breach

Published

7 hours ago

on

March 25, 2025

By

The National Security Agency was reportedly aware of vulnerabilities in the messaging app Signal weeks before 18 top Trump administration national security and defense officials used the app in a group chat to plan the recent bombing of Yemen. Those vulnerabilities, an NSA memo warned, were being exploited by Russian hackers. Details have also emerged that at least two top administration officials who were in the chat were overseas, including one in Moscow — where he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The use of the Signal app by the upper echelon of Donald Trump’s national security and defense team has rocked the nation, fueling concerns over the mishandling of sensitive—and potentially classified—information in ways that may be unlawful. These fears are seemingly compounded by Trump’s alleged mishandling of hundreds of classified documents, which led to criminal charges that were ultimately dropped after the U.S. Supreme Court granted presidents broad immunity from prosecution for official acts.

CBS News reports that the National Security Agency (NSA), an arm of the Pentagon, had “sent out an operational security special bulletin to its employees in February 2025 warning them of vulnerabilities in using the encrypted messaging application Signal.”

The NSA operates under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard.

The Pentagon also sent out a memo warning of Signal’s vulnerabilities and use by Russian hackers, just days after that group chat.

RELATED: ‘Sloppy, Careless, Incompetent’: National Security Chiefs Slammed in Senate Hearing

“Several days after top national security officials accidentally included a reporter in a Signal chat about bombing the Houthi sites in Yemen, a Pentagon-wide advisory warned against using the messaging app, even for unclassified information,” NPR reported Tuesday.

“Russian professional hacking groups are employing the ‘linked devices’ features to spy on encrypted conversations,” the Pentagon’s memo warned.

It also notes that Google has identified Russian hacking groups who are “targeting Signal Messenger to spy on persons of interest.”

The Pentagon memo reminded users that “third-party messaging apps (e.g. Signal) are permitted by policy for unclassified accountability/recall exercises but are not approved to process or store non-public unclassified information.”

NPR’s Quil Lawrence noted that “NPR has seen DoD memo as far back as 2023 prohibiting mobile apps for discussing even much less sensitive info like ‘controlled unclassified information.'”

Last month, a Google Threat Intelligence memo warned of the use of apps like Signal by “military personnel, politicians, journalists, activists, and other at-risk communities.”

Critics argue that the use of Signal for “war plans” was against policy. During Tuesday’s Senate Intelligence Committee hearing CIA Director John Ratcliffe had insisted Signal was approved for use.

National security experts, including at least one former Trump administration official, have been highly critical of the use of the app by the 18-members in a chat.

RELATED: ‘Who Exactly Is Running the Government?’: Trump’s War Plans Leak Denial Backfires

President Trump’s Ukraine and Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff “was in Moscow, where he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, when he was included in a group chat with more than a dozen other top administration officials — and inadvertently, one journalist — on the messaging app Signal,” CBS News reported on Tuesday. “Russia has repeatedly tried to compromise Signal, a popular commercial messaging platform that many were shocked to learn senior Trump administration officials had used to discuss sensitive military planning.”

Trump’s Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, acknowledged on Tuesday during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing that she was overseas during the Signal chat. The Associated Press reported the DNI “wouldn’t say whether she was using her personal or government-issued phone because the matter is under review by the White House National Security Council.”

The Wall Street Journal’s chief foreign-affairs correspondent Yaroslav Trofimov appears to be one of the first to note that Witkoff had been in Moscow during the time the chat had been organized. He notes: “The Signal app itself has high encryption. But if your phone is inside Russia, and especially if your WiFi and Bluetooth are not disabled, Russia can see what is inside your phone pretty easily.”

On Tuesday morning, U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) noted: “Not a single person out of 18 of the very most senior officials in this Admin — including the Director of National Intelligence and the CIA Director — voiced any concern with highly classified military plans circulated on Signal. You also can be sure this is not the only time.”

The Atlantic’s Dr. Norman Ornstein, a political scientist and scholar, responded to Congressman Goldman, writing: “Putin is giddy. He has compromised the phones of every top national security official in the Trump administration. No doubt has enough juicy information from what is likely to be multiple Signal chats to deeply damage American security. And possibly to blackmail some of them.”

RELATED: Trump Shrugs Off Signalgate, Backs Advisor at Center of National Security Scandal

 

Image via Reuters 

Continue Reading

News

‘Sloppy, Careless, Incompetent’: National Security Chiefs Slammed in Senate Hearing

Published

12 hours ago

on

March 25, 2025

By

Top Senate Democrats tore into the Directors of National Intelligence and the Central Intelligence Agency during a Tuesday hearing on global security threats, demanding answers after a bombshell report found they used an unsecured messaging app to plan a bombing in Yemen — possibly in violation of the law.

Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard refused to answer several questions from Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner (D-VA), including whether she participated in “the group chat with the Secretary of Defense and other Trump senior officials discussing the Yemen war plans.”

“Senator,” Gabbard replied, “I don’t want to get into the specifics,” a statement she made at least three times before the frustrated Vice Chair then asked: “Is this, is it because it’s all classified?”

RELATED: ‘Who Exactly Is Running the Government?’: Trump’s War Plans Leak Denial Backfires

Gabbard would only say that the incident “is currently under review by the National Security Council.”

“Because it’s all classified?” Warner pressed. “If it’s not classified, share the texts now. Is it classified or non-classified?”

Gabbard ultimately told Warner that “there was no classified materials that was shared in that Signal chat.”

He immediately replied, “If there was no classified material, share it with the committee.”

“You can’t have it both ways. These are important jobs. This is our national security,” Warner said, as Gabbard remained silent and expressionless.

But several Senators appeared to be unconvinced or uncomfortable with her claim of no classified information in the Signal chat.

U.S. Senator Angus King (I-ME) told Gabbard that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth “put into this group text a detailed operation plan, including targets, the weapons we were going to be using, attack sequences and timing—and yet you’ve testified that nothing in that text, in that chain was classified.”

“Wouldn’t that be classified? What if that had been made public that morning before the attack took place?” he asked.

RELATED: Trump Shrugs Off Signalgate, Backs Advisor at Center of National Security Scandal

“Senator,” Gabbard replied, “I can attest to the fact that there were no classified or intelligence equities that were included in that chat group at any time,” she insisted.

“So the attack sequencing and timing and weapons and targets you don’t consider should have been classified?” King asked.

“I defer to the to Secretary of Defense and the National Security Council on that question,” Gabbard responded.

“Well,” King, appearing somewhat dumbfounded, reminded Gabbard, “you’re the head of the intelligence community and you’re supposed to know about classifications.”

“So your testimony very clearly today is that nothing was in that set of texts that were classified,” King continued, noting that “if that’s the case, please release that whole text stream so that the public can have a a view of what actually transpired on this on this discussion.”

“It’s hard for me to believe that targets and timing and weapons would not have been classified,” he concluded.

U.S. Senator Mark Kelly (D-AZ) further pressed Gabbard on what Senator King had seemed to suggest might be potentially classified information.

“In the Signal chain, was there any mention of a target in Yemen?” he asked.

“I don’t remember mention of specific targets,” Gabbard replied.

“Any generic target?” Senator Kelly asked.

Gabbard, pausing, then replied, “I believe there was discussion around ‘targets,’ in general,” she said.

Earlier in the hearing, Vice Chair Warner had blasted the Trump national security officials who were using Signal, the unsecured messaging app, to map out the Yemen bombing.

“There’s plenty of declassified information that shows that our adversaries, China and Russia are trying to break in to encrypted systems like Signal,” the Vice Chair said. “I can just say this, if this was the case of the military officer or an intelligence officer, and they had this kind of behavior, they would be fired.”

“I think this is one more example of the kind of sloppy, careless, incompetent behavior, particularly towards classified information, that this is not a one off or a first time error,” he lamented.

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: Alina Habba Immediately Targets Top NJ Democrats After Trump Names Her New US Attorney

 

Image via Reuters 

 

 

 

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2020 AlterNet Media.