State Attorney General Letitia James.
Donna Aceto
The Office of New York State Attorney General Letitia James sent a cease-and-desist letter to Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman on March 1 demanding that he rescind his executive order barring transgender individuals from participating in sports in accordance with their gender identity at county-run facilities.
“The order’s immediate effect is to force sports leagues to make an impossible choice: discriminate against transgender women and girls, in violation of New York law, or find somewhere else to play,” wrote Sandra Park, who heads up the attorney general’s Civil Rights Bureau Office and signed the letter. The attorney general said the order violates New York’s civil and human rights law, and she also cited the Supreme Court’s 2020 landmark decision in which the court ruled that gender identity discrimination constitutes unlawful sex discrimination.
James is giving Blakeman five days to rescind what her office describes as “this unlawful order” and turn over all documents pertaining to his decision to issue the executive action. If he fails to comply, James said he faces further legal action.
“The law is perfectly clear: you cannot discriminate against a person because of their gender identity or expression,” James said in a written statement after the letter was delivered. “We have no room for hate or bigotry in New York. This executive order is transphobic and blatantly illegal. Nassau County must immediately rescind the order, or we will not hesitate to take decisive legal action.”
The letter comes one week after Blakeman rolled out the executive order, which stipulated that “any sports, leagues, organizations, teams, programs, or sports entities” must be classified based on participants’ gender assigned at birth in one of three categories: “males, men, or boys,” “females, women, or girls,” or “coed or mixed.” The order bans the…
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