President Obama's new directive ordering public schools to allow transgenders to use the bathroom with which they identify is stirring emotions in statehouses and living rooms from Texas to Indiana.
Reaction from Texas came fast and furious in advance of the directive being disseminated Friday to schools nationwide,
The Washington Post reported.
"I got news for President Barack Obama," Port Neches-Groves (Texas) Superintendent Rodney Canvass told
local TV station 12News. "He ain't my President and he can't tell me what to do. That letter is going straight to the paper shredder."
"This will be the beginning of the end of the public school system as we know it," Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick told Dallas-Fort Worth TV station
NBC 5.
Reaction was fierce in Indiana, as well.
Dr. Zach Rozelle, superintendent of the Union County/College Corner Joint School District, did not mince words to
CBS4 in Indianapolis.
"Another example of government … politicians using the public schools to promote their own political agenda -- little to no regard for the real impact on the right to privacy … security for all children," Rozelle said.
The Obama directive added gasoline to a raging fire on the national debate on gendered bathrooms and who should be allowed to use them.
"All children should be free from discrimination and harassment. Except the at-minimum 99.7 percent of kids who aren't transgender. They just need to suck it up," wrote
Federalist Managing Editor Joy Pullmann.
Though the president's directive comes with no enforcement power, it does threaten federal funding or lawsuits to the schools if they don't comply under Title IX. It virtually guarantees an extended court battle over presidential power, long after Obama leaves office.
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