Mississippi Senate Passes Most Sweeping Anti-LGBT Legislation in the U.S.

On the heels of North Carolina’s absurd anti-trans law passing, and only two days after Georgia’s governor vetoed a similar religious-exemption bill, Mississippi’s Senate has passed what critics are calling the most sweeping anti-LGBT legislation in the United States.

On Wednesday, the state’s Senate passed Mississippi’s House Bill 1523  that states public employees, businesses, and social workers cannot be punished for denying services based on the belief that marriage is strictly between a man and a woman.

This also goes for people who act on the belief that “sexual relations are properly reserved to such a marriage” and that gender is determined at birth. It says the government can’t prevent businesses from firing a transgender employee, clerks from refusing to license a same-sex marriage, or adoption agencies from refusing to place a child with a couple who they believe may be having premarital sex.

It also states that employers can enforce “sex-specific standards or policies concerning employee or student dress or grooming,” and can police bathroom use as they so choose.

This bill has now passed both the House and the Senate.

The state’s republicans are, unsurprisingly, defending the bill on the basis that it is protecting the rights of those who disagree with the supreme court ruling of same-sex marriage last June.

“I don’t think it’s discriminatory,” said Senator Jenifer Branning in a speech to her colleagues. “It takes no rights away from anyone. It gives protection to those in the state who cannot in a good conscience provide services for a same-sex marriage.”

Democrats, however, are arguing that the bill allows discrimination in too many instances.

“They say it’s about same-sex marriage,” said Senator John Horhn. “If that’s the case, why does it include adoptions? The[n] why does it allow discrimination in medical services? The reason we are so adamantly opposed to it is because we have already been there. We don’t need to put another stain on Mississippi.”

The bill passed the House 80-39 in February, but because it was amended slightly in the Senate, it will now return to the house for concurrence before it reaches the desk of Governor Phil Bryant.