A bipartisan group of senators on Tuesday asked National Basketball Association Commissioner Adam Silver to move the league’s All-Star Game from Charlotte, North Carolina, in response to a law that prohibits people from using the public facilities of the opposite sex.
The letter was signed by six senators, including Republican Sen. Mark Kirk of Illinois, who is up for re-election this year.
The senators said they “cannot condone or stand idly by as North Carolina moves to legalize and institutionalize discrimination against the LGBT community.”
“Nor should the NBA allow its premier annual event to be hosted in such a state,” the letter said. “Doing so, we believe, would be inconsistent with the NBA’s history and values.”
Other lawmakers who signed the letter are Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkeley, Vermont Sen. Pat Leahy, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin and Washington Sen. Patty Murray, who are all Democrats.
House Bill 2, the senators said, “provides businesses, government contractors, hotels, and other institutions with a license to discriminate, and no city council or county government can do a thing about it.”
SEE ALSO: Pat McCrory clarifies North Carolina bathroom bill
Republican Gov. Pat McCrory on Tuesday issued an executive order clarifying the law, allowing private businesses to regulate their own facilities however they choose. But he said the prohibitions on opposite-sex access to public restrooms would remain unchanged.
After he signed the bill into law last month, the NBA issued a statement denouncing the legislation as “discriminatory.”
“We are deeply concerned that this discriminatory law runs counter to our guiding principles of equality and mutual respect and do not yet know what impact it will have on our ability to successfully host the 2017 All-Star Game in Charlotte,” the league said in a statement.
The Atlanta City Council last month said its city would make a better venue for the All-Star Game.
“The City of Atlanta draws strength from our diverse community,” Atlanta City Council President Caesar Mitchell said in a resolution. “This unity creates our city’s embracing spirit, a quality that has made Atlanta the destination of choice for numerous international business conventions, professional and college sporting events, as well as one of the largest concentrations of Fortune 500 companies in the nation. We would certainly welcome the opportunity to show that very spirit as the host of the 2017 NBA All-Star Weekend.”
NBA spokesman Mike Bass said the league appreciated the invitation, but was “hopeful that the city of Charlotte and the state of North Carolina can work through their differences far in advance of the 2017 All-Star Game.”
The NBA is one of many corporations to disavow the North Carolina law. More than 130 CEOs from major corporations, including those from Apple, Facebook and Google, wrote a letter to Mr. McCrory asking him to repeal the legislation.
In response to the law, PayPal canceled a plan to build a new facility in Charlotte that the payments company said would have created 400 high-skilled jobs.
• Bradford Richardson can be reached at brichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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