Stein vetoes bills on gender issues and DEI, calling them 'mean-spirited'

Criticizing the state legislature for failing to pass a new state budget because lawmakers are too focused on culture war political fights, Gov. Josh Stein on Thursday vetoed four bills targeting diversity and gender issues.

Senate Bill 558, Senate Bill 227, House Bill 171 all deal with efforts to crack down on pro-diversity efforts in public schools and state government agencies. Supporters have cited Republican President Donald Trump's efforts to attack diversity, equity and inclusion programs in federal government and say North Carolina similarly needs to eliminate DEI.

The fourth bill, House Bill 805, started as an effort to help people take down private photos or videos of themselves from the internet and passed the state House unanimously. But the state Senate then turned the bill into a grab-bag of social conservative issues about transgender people and other issues related to gender and LGBTQ rights, and the House also agreed to pass that new version of the bill which Stein has now vetoed in addition to the DEI bills.

Meanwhile, when the state's new fiscal year began this week, state lawmakers were on vacation without having passed a new budget. They've made no progress on negotiations for a spending plan and, just before the legislature adjourned, House Speaker Destin Hall told reporters the GOP lawmakers had such strong disagreements on how to fund state government that it's possible no budget deal gets passed at all until sometime next year.

Stein said that his vetoes highlight his belief that the Republican-led legislature has its priorities all wrong.

“At a time when teachers, law enforcement, and state employees need pay raises and people need shorter lines at the DMV, the legislature failed to pass a budget and, instead, wants to distract us by stoking culture wars that further divide us," Stein wrote. "These mean-spirited bills would marginalize vulnerable people and also undermine the quality of public services and public education. Therefore, I am vetoing them. I stand ready to work with the legislature when it gets serious about protecting people and addressing North Carolinians’ pressing concerns.”

State House Majority Leader Rep. Brenden Jones, R-Columbus, has been a key proponent of the anti-DEI measures and criticized Stein's veto Thursday.

"I find it odd that Gov. Stein is against merit based hiring in state government," Jones said. "I look forward to overriding this veto."

The vetoes come a day after Stein also vetoed three other bills including a Duke Energy-backed bill to let the utility giant avoid climate goals and change the way it charges North Carolinians.

The three DEI-focused bills Stein vetoed Thursday would each target different parts of state government.

House Bill 171 says no state workers or agency leaders can make any decisions on hiring based on "race, sex, color, ethnicity, nationality, country of origin, or sexual orientation." People who are found in violation would be fired and subject to a $5,000 fine. The bill would also let people who think they didn't get a job or a promotion in state government to sue, if they thought DEI played a role.

It would also ban human resources trainings in state government that focus too much on diversity issues, threatening a $10,000 fine against any state employees who set up DEI trainings.

But the bill does almost nothing to define what it considers banned DEI topics to be, leaving it open to interpretation — and the possibility for selective or politically motivated inquests. Stein said that was one of his main concerns with the bill, saying it "is riddled with vague definitions yet imposes extreme penalties for unknowable violations."

Senate Bill 227 and Senate Bill 558 target any course curriculum, readings, homework or classroom discussion on DEI-related topics in public K-12 schools, community colleges and universities, as well as banning their employees from being given any DEI-related training courses.

Democratic critics said the rules might make it impossible for teachers to say that slavery was bad, or that it even existed, since it inherently deals with racial issues. They also fear it will scare school leaders into telling teachers not to tell students about the Civil Rights movement, the 1898 coup in Wilmington by white supremacists who overthrew the Reconstruction-era town government, or other parts of North Carolina history that make white conservatives uncomfortable. Republican lawmakers said that wasn't their intent with the bill, but Stein is unconvinced.

"Our diversity is our strength," he wrote. "We should not whitewash history, ban books or treat our teachers with distrust and disdain. Rather than fearing different viewpoints and cracking down on free speech, we should ensure our students can learn from diverse perspectives and form their own opinions."

House Bill 805, originally intended to crack down on revenge porn and similar concerns, turned into a broad range of priorities of Christian conservative activists. On transgender issues, it would officially define gender to exclude transgender people, ban state dollars from being used on transgender surgeries and make it easier for people who come to regret a sex-change surgery to sue their former doctors.

It would also let parents block public schools from allowing their children to check out certain books from the library, and it would allow children to skip any classes or homework that the parents believe "would impose a substantial burden on the student's religious beliefs." The bill includes no limits, leaving the door open for parents to pull their children out of any lessons on science, history or other topics they disagree with.

Stein's veto message focused mostly on the anti-transgender parts of the bill. He said he would've signed the bill if it had been limited to just the revenge-porn reforms and encouraged the legislature to pass a bill with only those provisions.

"My faith teaches me that we are all children of God no matter our differences and it is wrong to target vulnerable people, as this bill does," Stein wrote. "I stand ready to work with the legislature when it gets serious about protecting people, instead of mean-spirited attempts to further divide us."

The North Carolina Republican Party responded that it's Stein who's not being serious about protecting people.

"With the appalling veto of HB 805, Gov. Stein and his radical allies disrespect women across North Carolina in service of a far left-wing agenda voters time again have made clear they reject," the NCGOP wrote.