County Exec Sues New York Over An Order To Rescind His Ban On Transgender Feminine Athletes

MINEOLA, N.Y.: A county govt within the New York Metropolis suburbs has filed a federal lawsuit difficult a state order demanding he rescind a controversial ban on transgender athletes competing in women and girls’s sports activities.

Nassau County Govt Bruce Blakeman stated in a lawsuit filed Tuesday that the “stop and desist” letter issued by state Legal professional Common Letitia James violates the U.S. Structure’s “equal safety” clause, which is enshrined within the 14th Modification.

The Republican argues that forcing him to rescind his Feb. 22 govt order denies “organic females’ proper to equal alternatives in athletics” in addition to their “proper to a protected taking part in subject” by exposing them to elevated threat of damage in the event that they’re pressured to compete towards transgender ladies.

Blakeman is slated to carry a information convention at his workplace in Mineola on Wednesday together with a 16-year-old feminine volleyball participant who lives in Nassau County and her dad and mom who’re additionally plaintiffs within the lawsuit.

James’ workplace didn’t instantly reply to requests for touch upon the litigation.

The Democrat on Friday had threatened authorized motion if Blakeman didn’t rescind the order in per week, arguing in her letter that the native order violates New York’s anti-discrimination legal guidelines and topics ladies’s and women sports activities groups to “intrusive and invasive questioning” and different pointless necessities.

“The regulation is completely clear: You can not discriminate towards an individual due to their gender identification or expression. We now have no room for hate or bigotry in New York,” James stated on the time.

Blakeman argues in his lawsuit that the order doesn’t outright ban transgender people from taking part in any sports activities within the county. Transgender feminine athletes will nonetheless be capable of play on male or co-ed groups, he stated.

Blakeman’s order requires any sports activities groups, leagues, packages or organizations looking for a allow from the county’s parks and recreation division to “expressly designate” whether or not they’re male, feminine or coed based mostly on their members’ “organic intercourse at start.”

It covers greater than 100 websites within the densely populated county subsequent to New York Metropolis, from ballfields to basketball and tennis courts, swimming swimming pools and ice rinks.

The chief order adopted scores of payments enacted in Republican-governed states over the previous few years focusing on transgender folks. ___

Related Press reporter Michael Hill in Albany, New York contributed to this story.

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Comply with Philip Marcelo at twitter.com/philmarcelo.

(This story has not been edited by News18 employees and is printed from a syndicated information company feed – Related Press)