NORTH CAROLINA: Governor Has The Sadz After 68 Major Companies Join Brief Against Hate Laws

From the Raleigh News & Observer:

American Airlines, Microsoft and Marriott are among 68 companies that signed an amicus brief in the lawsuit challenging North Carolina’s House Bill 2.

Former U.S. Solicitor General Ted Olson authored the brief on behalf of Human Rights Campaign, the LGBT advocacy group that is leading opposition to the law. The brief will be filed in the lawsuit currently pending between state leaders and the U.S. Department of Justice, which is trying to strike down the law as discriminatory.

“That so many in the business community are willing to stand up in opposition to HB2 underscores the immeasurable and irreparable harm the law is doing to the transgender community and to North Carolina’s economy,” Olson said in a news release.

In the brief, the companies argue that the law is “an affront to their nondiscrimination policies” and “undermines their ability to do business within and outside of North Carolina,” according to the news release.

From the office of Gov. Pat McCrory:

“It’s disappointing that some companies are joining the Obama administration’s position which jeopardizes those long-held expectations of privacy. Those corporations that have joined the left-wing HRC are ignoring the fact that they operate in 22 other states, which like North Carolina, are challenging the federal government’s overreach.”

The full list of signees:



Accenture, Affirm, Inc., Airbnb, Inc., American Airlines, Apple, Biogen, Bloomberg LP, Boehinger Ingleheim USA, Box, Brocade Communications System, Inc., Capital One Financial Corporation, Cisco Systems, Inc., Consumer Technology Association, Corning Incorporated, Cummins Inc., Dropbox, Inc., Dupont, eBay, Inc., Etsy, Everlaw, Expedia, FiftyThree, Galxyz, Gap Inc., General Electric Company, Glassdoor, Inc., Grokker, Hilton Worldwide, Honor, IBM Corporation, IKEA North American Services, LLC, Instacart, Intel Corporation, John Hancock, Levi Strauss & Co., LinkedIn Corporation, Logitech, Marriott International, Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, Microsoft Corporation, Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams, Morgan Stanley, Nextdoor, NIKE, OppenheimerFunds, Orbitz Worldwide, PayPal, Pepo, Quotient, RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Red Hat, Replacements, Ltd., Salesforce, Slack, SV Angel LLC, Symantec Corporation, TD Bank, NA, Teespring, The Dow Chemical Company, Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc, ThirdLove, Tumblr, UnifyID, United Airlines, Inc., Williams-Sonoma, Inc., Yelp, ZestFinance, and Zynga.