PD Editorial: Texas sues California to defend LGBTQ discrimination

Once again, Texas is mad at California. Both states ought to reconsider whether their mutual ire is worthwhile.

On Feb. 10, Texas officials asked the U.S. Supreme Court to invalidate California's ban on using state money for travel to any of 11 states that have passed laws discriminatory toward the LGBTQ community. The resulting economic impact on Texas is “born of religious animus,” according to the lawsuit.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra put Texas on the boycott list in 2017 after the Lone Star State permitted foster care and adoption agencies to deny services based on religious beliefs. Becerra said that allows discrimination against LGBTQ children, foster parents and adoptive parents.

There's a certain cognitive dissonance to the whole thing. One state empowers its residents to discriminate against the LGBTQ community, and then it cries foul when another state discriminates against, in the words of California lawmakers, “the last gasp of a decrepit worldview.” Should every state look the other way when bigotry happens elsewhere? That seems to be what Texas wants.

The other states California is boycotting are Alabama, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota and Tennessee.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who filed the lawsuit, has made what he calls “religious liberty” a hallmark of his administration. That is his right. It is California's right, as an employer, to choose where it spends taxpayer dollars on official travel.

To be clear, other than raising awareness about discrimination, this ban has no effect on travel by private individuals or businesses that aren't spending state money.

But here's the question for both states: Are the ban and the lawsuit worth it?

Fighting discrimination and bigotry against the LGBTQ community or any other marginalized group is certainly a worthwhile cause, but the boycott hasn't actually halted all state travel to Texas and other banned states. It's only created a two-tiered system.

Athletic teams from California's public universities continue to compete in Texas and the other states. They just have to use private funds for their expenses. Even some California lawmakers who voted for the ban have gone to those states, financing their official travel with campaign funds instead of state tax dollars.

Then there are state-funded groups that don't have sports boosters or campaign funds to fall back on. For example, a group of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo students couldn't attend the National Organization of Minority Architects' annual conference in Houston after their state funding disappeared.

California law shouldn't pit societal aims against one another. Supporting professional opportunities for students of color shouldn't be the price of fighting discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

Tit-for-tat policymaking can backfire, reinforcing states' positions instead of fueling the social change that California lawmakers sought. Oklahoma has retaliated by banning state-funded travel to California. Tennessee prohibited its lawmakers from using state money to attend a Los Angeles conference. Where will it end?

Hopefully not in the Supreme Court. It's not the job of justices or the Texas attorney general to stop California state lawmakers from making legitimate policy decisions. Rather, California lawmakers should dispassionately consider whether the law is achieving its intended goals and what the unintended consequences have been.

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