By L.A. Williams
Christian Action League
November 21, 2019
“North Carolina is an open and welcoming place for all kinds of people,” Gov. Roy Cooper told attendees at the NC IDEA Ecosystem Summit on Tuesday, while at the same time making clear his disdain for the kinds of people who stand up against infanticide or seek to ensure fundamental rights of privacy, or protect religious liberty.
He cited HB2 in his speech at the North Hills Raleigh Hilton and, in a separate interview with the media, labeled the Born-alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act “social, right-wing legislation” that is not good for business.
“Call it right-wing, call it bad for business, call it not valuing diversity, if you will, but if you’re going to tell the truth you should call it what it really is – a law against infanticide!” said the Rev. Mark Creech, executive director of the Christian Action League. “God help us when we’re led by public officials who tout that infanticide is good for business, and people who stand against it are social right-wingers who ought to be ignored.”
Creech said the Born-Alive bill — which would have created new penalties for infanticide, specifically for situations in which a fetus survives an abortion procedure — was and remains necessary legislation, despite the Governor’s mischaracterization.
“The Governor is grossly mistaken about it – terribly mistaken! A baby targeted for abortion who was born alive because of a botched abortion has the crosshairs on him from the start: the doctor who just performed the abortion wanted him dead, the mother wanted him dead, but Providence has placed that infant on the table alive despite all odds. The child falling from the mother’s body is a human being, a United States citizen, and deserves the God-given right, the Constitutional right to life, and ought to be vigorously protected by the state,” Creech said. “To neglect that born-alive baby because it was targeted for an abortion, to toss it aside, is an unconscionable crime against God and man.”
Although lawmakers in N.C. House voted 67-53 against Cooper’s veto of the bill this fall, they lacked the needed super-majority for an override.
Creech also disagreed with Cooper’s assessment of HB2.
Commonly referred to as “the bathroom bill,” HB2 was passed by the North Carolina General Assembly in March 2016 and signed by then-Governor Pat McCrory as a way to overturn an ordinance, which was a constitutional overreach by the city of Charlotte. The ordinance added “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to the city’s nondiscrimination laws. The ordinance permitted individuals, regardless of biological anatomy, to use any restroom, locker room, shower, or changing place they chose.
“Gov. Cooper said HB2 was ‘cooked up by some leaders that do not reflect the values of North Carolinians,’” said the Rev. Creech. “But the ones doing the cooking were the Charlotte City Council. Their recipe, their ordinance, not only created a loophole sexual predators could exploit, putting women and children in situations of danger, but it also unfairly allowed the government to interfere into private businesses and churches by forcing them to promote ideas and participate in events that conflicted with their peacefully expressed religious or moral beliefs. State lawmakers behind HB 2 weren’t doing the cooking; they were just responding with legislation that clarified current law. If anybody was cooking up anything, it was Charlotte and her LGBTQ cohorts. They were trying to bowl one over the people of North Carolina. HB 2 was meant to stop their shenanigans.”
Creech said that when HB 2 became law in the Tar Heel State, “gay rights activists, a Leftist media, the Democratic Party, celebrities, and various progressives initiated a national effort to smear the measure.”
He said Cooper, who was the state Attorney General at the time, used HB2 during an election year to distract from Gov. McCory’s success righting the state’s economy, while also erroneously painting Republican lawmakers that supported it as “socially behind the times and backward.”
HB2 was repealed in 2017 and replaced with House Bill 142, which instituted a moratorium on local ordinances regulating public accommodations or private employment practices until Dec. 1, 2020. The sunset on HB 142 was in anticipation that the courts would settle the matter before then.
Creech said Cooper’s contention that he is still actively trying to undo the economic damage from HB2 is pure exaggeration, especially since studies do not support the idea that so-called SOGI laws (sexual orientation/gender identity) are good for business.
According to a 2016 report from Alliance Defending Freedom, “Numerous studies suggest that states without these classifications actually have greater economic growth, while many states that have added these classifications to their laws have weaker economies and lower job growth.”
The Chief Executive website showed that as of 2016, nine out of the top 10 states for business did not have SOGI laws.
“North Carolina needs another Governor,” quipped Rev. Creech. “If you believe children who are born alive from a botched abortion need protection, if you believe in fundamental rights to privacy, and safety for our women and children, if you believe in religious liberty, then to this Governor you’re at the lower end of our state’s citizenry. You need to go to the back of the bus.”