On Friday it was reported by NHPR that New Hampshire’s useless Attorney General Joe Foster filed an amicus brief supporting Obama’s transgender ‘guidance’ to allow males who have gender identity issues to use female bathrooms, changing rooms and locker rooms and vice versa. The problem is that the majority of Granite Staters are absolutely against these new rules being handed down from the federal government.
Aside from the fact that most people have had it with interference from the federal government into local school issues, there has been outrage against those schools who have decided to enforce this “guidance” handed down by the Obama Administration. When the Candia school board decided to push this same policy, parents against it came out in hordes but the school board ignored the majority and pushed it through anyway.
Of course, the Candia school board lawyer wasn’t quite clear about the law. Schools are allowed, according to Title IX, to have separate bathrooms. This means they could indeed have a separate bathroom/locker room area for transgender students and it would not be considered discrimination. From Alliance Defending Freedom:
MYTH: Title IX requires schools to allow transgender students in the restrooms and locker rooms of the opposite sex.
FACT: There is no such requirement in Title IX. In fact, Title IX recognizes the safety and privacy concerns with letting students use opposite-sex facilities and allows schools to “provide separate toilet, locker room, and shower facilities on the basis of sex.”
MYTH: The U.S. Department of Education says Title IX requires schools to let transgender students use the restrooms and locker rooms of their choice.
FACT: The DOE did make this determination in a non-binding letter. However, attempts to add this requirement to Title IX have failed, and it still allows for separate facilities for transgender students.
MYTH: Courts have ruled against schools that have refused to allow transgender students in the restrooms of their choice.
FACT: Just the opposite, in fact. At least three federal courts, in Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, have ruled that Title IX does NOT require schools to allow transgender students to use opposite-sex restrooms.
MYTH: Allowing transgender students in the restrooms of their choice does not violate student privacy.
FACT: Courts have recognized that this is not true. Children at school, employees at work, and even felons in prison have the right to bodily privacy –to change, use the restroom, and bathe unseen by members of the opposite sex.
MYTH: If transgender students use the restrooms consistent with their biological sex, they will be harmed.
FACT: Schools can accommodate students struggling with gender confusion by providing separate facilities that give them a safe, private location while also protecting other students’ privacy.
Knowing all of this, New Hampshire’s attorney general, with the support of Governor Maggie Hassan, has still decided to back Obama’s ridiculous “guidance.” Both Foster and Hassan also know that a majority of parents in the Granite State also do not support the Department of Justice in this matter. Even in Candia, a majority of parents didn’t support the school board’s decision to follow this guidance yet the school board ignored the parents.
Once again Maggie Hassan proves her alliance to federal government control over local matters. 21 states are challenging the Obama Administration over their unenforceable guidance but not New Hampshire under Maggie Hassan’s rule. Nope, Hassan decided to joinsome of the most liberal states (12 in all) in the country and support Obama’s guidance. Once again Hassan proves that she cares nothing about what her constituents want in the state because her political party is far more important.
Cross posted from NH Political Buzz
