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NC Senate passes LGBTQ bill requiring teachers to out trans students to parents

Republicans say teachers and students shouldn't be keeping secrets from parents, especially about a child's sexuality or mental health. But Democrats fear stigmatizing LGBTQ students, or forcing teachers to out them to their parents, will lead to an increase in suicides and child abuse.

Posted Updated

By
Will Doran
and
Travis Fain, WRAL state government reporters,
and
Laura Leslie, WRAL capitol bureau chief

The North Carolina Senate passed a controversial bill Tuesday that would require teachers to notify parents if a student questions their gender, sending it next to the state House for final approval.

The Republican-backed Parents’ Bill of Rights has been met with backlash from LGBTQ advocates, students and parents. Critics say the measure could lead to children being abused in unaccepting homes. Republicans say it’s necessary to stop children from keeping secrets from their parents.

The House now needs to decide whether to make changes or vote on it as-is. Republican leaders in that chamber have said they're likely to create their own version.

Sen. Amy Galey, a bill sponsor, said the bill acknowledges parents as the primary decision-makers for their children, not the school, and not the children themselves. Galey, R-Alamance, said parents deserve to make decisions based on their own cultural, social and religious beliefs. "The government is not a partner in raising our children," she said.

Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper opposes the bill. He said Tuesday that North Carolina’s economic growth is due in part to the fact that the state has for the most part stayed out of the culture wars that have roiled other states.

“Not only are these kinds of bills wrong in and of themselves because they hurt people, they also have the great potential to hurt our economy and to upset this balance that we’ve created in this state that has been so successful,” he told reporters Tuesday. “Why would you want to run the train off the tracks?”

Cooper would likely veto the bill if it passes the full legislature.

But with Republicans needing to flip just one Democratic legislator to override a potential veto, the bill could set up an early battle in the new 2023 session of the North Carolina General Assembly on culture war issues — particularly for the few remaining rural Democrats, whose constituents tend to be more conservative on social issues.

Nationwide, advocates say more than 200 anti-LGBTQ bills have been filed. Kendra Johnson, the executive director of gay rights group Equality NC, said that's not lost on young people who may be struggling already.

"We know that anti-LGBTQ legislation has a negative impact on the mental health of LGBTQ+ youth, who already experience disproportionate adverse health outcomes," she said in a press release after the bill passed Tuesday.

Many of the bill’s proposed changes are relatively uncontroversial and deal with guaranteeing parents have input at their kids’ schools, if they don’t already. But the parts of the bill with the most attention — from both supporters and opponents — are the new requirements for teachers and other school workers that critics say are part of a nationwide trend of anti-LGBTQ legislation.

Teachers, coaches and other school employees at any grade level would be required to sometimes out LGBTQ students to their parents, even against the students’ wishes, under one part of the bill.

'Do no harm'

Sen. Lisa Grafstein, D-Wake, spoke against the bill Tuesday, saying she believes she is the only LGBTQ member of the state Senate. She recalled believing in the 1980’s “that there was something wrong with me” and said a teacher made her feel better simply by writing in her yearbook, “Dare to be different.”

Grafstein spoke of the high suicide rates for LGBTQ children and said she’s heard “genuine fears” about this bill from parents, students and medical professionals. But “not one parent has contacted me to say that they were cut out of decision making about their child,” Grafstein said.

The first-term senator beseeched her colleagues to think deeply and to “do no harm.” To ask themselves whether they’re sure that “not one young person will be outed to an abusive parent” or commit suicide because of this bill.

"Will you be sure that you did no harm by passing this bill?” she asked. “That not one young person will feel like they're trapped and have no one to trust?”

Galey responded that government employees don’t have confidential relationships with children, and not telling parents the pronouns their child goes by at school and on official paperwork is tantamount to the entire school “lying to the parents at home about the very essential thing with their child

“And that does harm,” Galey said.

Galey also noted the bill includes an exception for when a reasonable person believes a child will be abused.

It’s not just lawmakers debating the issue. Over the past week dozens of parents, children and activists have attended legislative committee meetings to tell lawmakers what they think of the bill.

At a long committee meeting Monday night filled with emotional speeches from activists on both sides of the issue, representatives of the conservative Moms For Liberty group said parents deserve to know everything that’s going on with their kids, and that teachers and children shouldn’t be keeping secrets from them.

A number of adults and teenagers who identified as being trans, gay or lesbian also spoke out at the meeting. They said forcing children to out themselves will lead to an increase in both child abuse and youth suicides.

Schools would also be banned from teaching anything related to gender or sexual identity in grades K-4. Conservative supporters say that’s common sense, but liberal opponents fear it will lead to childrens’ books being banned for portraying families with two moms or dads, for example.

Many critics have compared that part of the bill to “Don’t Say Gay” bills passed in other states like Florida — a comparison Republican lawmakers dislike, saying that unlike some of those other bills, this bill wouldn’t completely ban teachers from mentioning anything about LGBTQ people. The bill’s GOP sponsors said teachers would still be allowed to answer students’ questions on the topic if they come up, unplanned, during classroom time.

Democrats’ bills

Democrats on Tuesday unveiled their own versions of the bill, which have been filed in both legislative chambers. The bills share some of the same broad goals of the GOP-backed Senate bill in terms of guaranteeing that parents can have more knowledge and input when it comes to schools. But the Democrats’ version doesn’t contain any of the language targeting LGBTQ issues that Republicans included in theirs.

Democrats say their versions would help protect the educational rights of parents and students. They say lawmakers should focus on real problems facing schools, like lack of funding and teacher shortages.

“We know that the freedom for kids to live their dreams starts in safe and welcoming schools,” Sen. Michael Garrett, D-Guilford, said Tuesday at a news conference. “That’s why we want to work with parents, teachers and students to make our schools safer and stronger. Our bill seeks to protect students from discrimination while keeping parents informed about their child's safety and education, while creating a supporting and thriving school and classroom environment.”

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