Oklahoma Lawmakers: Impeach Obama Over Trans Bathroom Policy
Republican lawmakers in Oklahoma want to impeach President Obama. Why? Because the POTUS supports transgender rights and equality and issued a recommendation that public schools allow trans students to use the bathroom they identify with. As Reuters reports, the Oklahoma lawmakers were inspired by last week’s letter sent out by the Obama administration, which told U.S. schools that transgender students must be allowed to use the bathroom of their choice.
Indeed, the Oklahoma lawmakers were so offended by President Obama’s support for trans rights that they introduced a resolution on May 19 calling on Oklahoma representatives in Washington D.C. to file articles of impeachment against the president. Barack Obama isn’t the only one being targeted by Oklahoma Republican lawmakers, either. The lawmakers want to see the U.S. secretary of education and U.S. attorney general impeached, too.
So far, a vote hasn’t been scheduled on the Oklahoma resolution.
Oklahoma, a socially conservative state, doubled down on its efforts to prevent non-transgender students from having to share public restrooms with people who don’t share their biological gender. On Friday, May 20, Oklahoma lawmakers introduced another piece of legislation that would let public school students to claim a “religious right” to have “separate but equal” bathrooms to “segregate them” from their transgender classmates.
The “separate but equal” religious exemption bill could be a nightmare for Oklahoma schools. It would cost facilities dearly to construct new bathroom facilities to comply with the law, and Oklahoma schools simply don’t have the funds. Just this year, lawmakers in the state drastically cut education funding in order to cover a $1.3 state budget gap.
The transgender bathroom bill proposed by Republican Oklahoma lawmakers, on the other hand, would force schools to provide segregated bathrooms, changing room and showers for students who say that they need them to accommodate their “religious beliefs.” The newly-introduced proposal would also allow the Oklahoma attorney general to file lawsuits against schools to make sure that the segregated bathroom facilities were provided.
Oklahoma lawmakers in favor of impeaching the POTUS say that Obama has overstepped his constitutional authority by telling schools that the rights of trans students must be recognized.
Freedom Oklahoma (an LGBT advocacy group) Troy Stevenson called Oklahoma lawmakers out on their proposal to impeach the president and their newly-suggested state legislation.
“In a time when our state is facing an unprecedented economic crisis, our lawmakers should be focused on righting the ship rather than stigmatizing transgender youth.”
The new Oklahoma transgender bathroom legislation was introduced by state lawmakers just after they approved a bill making it a felony to perform abortions in Oklahoma.
Oklahoma’s anti-abortion bill was vetoed on Friday by the state’s super-conservative and unapologetically pro-life governor Mary Fallin. According to Governor Fallin, the bill wouldn’t have withstood the numerous legal challenges it would have undoubtedly faced. Oklahoma lawmakers who backed the abortion bill, which would have been the most restrictive in the United States, said that their goal was to challenge Roe v. Wade in the court system and ultimately try to make abortion illegal in the U.S. The Oklahoma abortion bill had no provisions for rape and/or incest victims.
What do you think? Are Oklahoma lawmakers in the right to suggest the impeachment of Barack Obama, or is this just more wasted legislation?
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