HB 2 Trial date set, DNC emails on HB 2 leaked, HB 2 and Dem Convention, 4 North Carolinians speak at DNC Convention against HB 2
By M.H. Cavanaugh
Christian Action League
July 29, 2016
It’s been a busy week with HB 2, commonly referred to as “the bathroom bill,” in the headlines. A written order by a federal magistrate on Monday announced the trial date for HB 2. Emails leaked by WikiLeaks showed that the Democratic National Committee had been working against North Carolina, even cheering at losses of money related to HB 2. The “bathroom bill” was also front and center at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, featuring “transgendered restrooms” and four North Carolinian personalities who took the stage at the convention to demean it.
Trial Date for HB 2 is Set
Monday, in a written order, a federal magistrate announced that the trial date for HB 2 – Public Facilities Privacy and Security Act would be November 14. The lawsuit before the court, brought by Lambda Legal, an LGBT legal defense group, and the American Civil Liberties Union, challenges both the bathroom provision of HB 2 and the provision that prevents cities from adopting non-discrimination policies that are not in state law.
Presiding in the case will be U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder.
Prior to the November 14 case, Schroeder will consider the motion for a preliminary injunction, which could result in preventing the law from being enforced until the end of the trial.
Emails Leaked by WikiLeaks
The email scandal that erupted last week after emails leaked by WikiLeaks revealed the Democratic National Committee was collaborating with the Clinton Campaign to shut out Bernie Sanders, also showed that the DNC pushed a national narrative against HB 2.
According to CBS North Carolina, “the NC GOP expressed outrage, indicating that emails reveal state Democrats cheering as the state lost money.”
The emails indicate that the firestorm surrounding the new law was a strategic attack on the NC GOP, now in power.
Tuesday, the Christian Post, reported, “North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory maintained that it wasn’t North Carolina that brought the transgender debate to the nation but rather ‘it was strategically brought to North Carolina’ by the ‘best political machine’ and ‘best media machine’ that he has ever seen. That machine, headed by the national pro-LGBT organizations like Human Rights Campaign, also included the DNC, emails from top DNC officials that were stolen by hackers…”
According to ABC II, Tuesday, Gov. McCrory said during a question and answer session after a news conference on an agricultural bill: “What’s most disturbing is that these emails have clearly shown something that we have suspected all along. That’s the state of North Carolina, the city of Charlotte and especially small businesses are being used as a pawn by Roy Cooper, by the mayor of Charlotte and by the Democratic Party, on an issue that was made up purely for a political purpose and to raise money.”
“They cheered,” added McCrory. “They literally cheered when businesses would boycott our great state.”
Some of the emails mock supporters of HB 2 in North Carolina as “backwater,” “moronic,” and “bigots.”
“The emails clearly reveal the collusion between the LGBT activists groups, Roy Cooper, the Democratic Party, and a leftist media,” said Dr. Mark Creech, executive director of the Christian Action League. “This is about power in North Carolina. From the very start, the mayor of Charlotte and the Charlotte City Council created this mess for political gain. These political forces could care less about our state’s economy or its citizens. They knew that the Republicans would have to respond by overturning Charlotte’s egregious ordinance, but they would scheme to bring the wrath of national and even global liberalism against the NC GOP. Moreover, they would hold our state and its women and children hostage to the most perfidious of forces, just so that they might regain power in the Governor’s office or the General Assembly.”
HB 2 and the Democratic National Convention
Various media reports also noted this week that HB 2 was front and center at the Democratic National Convention. The Wells Fargo Center, where the event was held, featured “All-Gender” restrooms as a part of the Democratic Party’s show of so-called inclusiveness.
HotAir.com, however, reported from the convention that the transgender bathrooms were a “great transgender cover up.” In an article posted on their website, Tuesday, reporter Jazz Shaw provided via pictures that the restrooms were not permanently set up as transgender bathrooms. Instead the DNC had only mounted signs over the traditional existing restrooms.
Shaw wrote, “All the ones I located thus far were put up over the women’s rooms.”
He added, “Every lady I speak to who bothers to comment on the subject always complains that the lines at public bathrooms in big venues are always terribly long for the ladies while the guys skate right through. Why would you divert even more traffic to the ladies room? That just seems rather War one Womenish, doesn’t it? Either way, once the DNC clears out I’m guessing that this arena won’t have alternate bathroom designations anymore.”
But N.C. Republican Party Director Dallas Woodhouse made the most substantive statement about the featured transgendered bathrooms, telling the Raleigh News and Observer (N&O) that the DNC’s move to have transgendered bathrooms during their convention wouldn’t be illegal under HB 2.
“The DNC’s decision for ‘all-gender bathrooms’ is consistent with HB 2, as HB 2 allows private entities to set their own bathroom policies, unlike the forceful nature of Charlotte’s illegal ordinance on private entities,” he told the N&O in an email on Wednesday.
Four North Carolinians Speak
Four North Carolinians, who were featured speakers at the Democratic National Convention, railed against HB 2.
Raleigh business owners Jesse Lipson of Citrix and his wife Brooks Bell of Brooks Bell, Inc. spoke. Lipson spoke on Monday and Bell on Wednesday. Both erroneously claimed that HB 2 was hurting North Carolina’s economy and faulted Trump’s running mate, Mike Pence, for his support of a Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) that he supported while Governor in Indiana – a measure for protecting religious liberty.
Dr. Creech said that Lipson and Bell had obviously drunk the Kool-Aid of the progressives.
“It’s nonsense,” he said. “HB 2 hasn’t affected our state’s bottom line. It’s staring them and all of us right in the face. North Carolina has a $425 million surplus. We’ve ranked as number 5 in CNBC’s annual top states for business. In fact, I think God is blessing us because we’ve resisted the immoral agenda and pressures of the Left.”
The Rev. William Barber, who has led the Moral Monday movement in North Carolina, spoke on Thursday, the last day of the convention. Barber claimed that religion was being used in the Tar Heel state to “camouflage meanness.” He said America has a heart problem and “[w]e are called on to be the moral defibrillators of our time.”
Dr. Creech argued that ministers like the Rev. William Barber are like the false prophets of Israel. “They claim morality. They claim to speak for God. But they don’t call out sin, instead they preach to ‘itching ears.’ He said. “They placate sinful purposes and even join forces with it. Barber is a revised version of Christianity that honors what God condemns and condemns what God honors.”
Sarah McBride, a transgender activist from North Carolina, spoke on Thursday night too. McBride, a man who identifies as a woman, was the first transgender person to address a major political party convention.
“We’re living in a day when such is celebrated and seen to be normal by many, but no matter how much McBride or others tell us so, it isn’t. Instead, it’s a disorder. We should show kindness and patience, but we shouldn’t have to redesign the world to accommodate their inability to embrace reality,” said Dr. Creech.