Amid continued attempts by the Trump administration to roll back transgender rights in the United States, Massachusetts voters are set to decide whether or not to eliminate a 2016 state law protecting transgender individuals from discrimination in public spaces like restaurants and shops. The 6 November ballot question will mark the first statewide referendum in the country that threatens to revoke previously guaranteed transgender rights. If the law is successfully repealed, transgender rights activists worry that it could trigger similar campaigns elsewhere in the country. “Question 3 poses significant consequences for transgender people across Massachusetts, but it also would have significant consequences for transgender people across the country,” said Sarah McBride, the national press secretary of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBT rights group.
“If opponents of equality can win here they’re going to take those strategies, they’re going to take those tactics and they’re going to try to replicate them in other places,” she added.
Ballot question 3 asks voters if they want to keep or repeal a 2016 law that prohibits discrimination against transgender people in public spaces and allows them to use bathrooms consistent with their gender identity.
Full Article: ‘This is life or death’: trans people threatened by Massachusetts vote | Society | The Guardian.