The New York Times reports:
A coalition of social conservatives, Republican officials and pastors who fought for the repeal of a measure banning discrimination based on factors like age, race and sex wanted voters here to call it by another name — the Bathroom Ordinance. It worked.
Stories from Our Advertisers
When many voters here went to the polls on Tuesday, instead of thinking about discrimination, they focused on what public facilities a transgender person could use.
In the predominantly black section of Houston called the Third Ward, a historic yet struggling community where concerns for civil rights are a given, several voters at a polling site in the Cuney Homes public housing complex said they had voted against the ordinance because, as parents, they were concerned that it would do precisely what one of the opposition’s TV ads depicted — allow men claiming or pretending to be women to enter women’s bathrooms and inflict harm.
There's more:
The ordinance’s defeat at the polls — 61 percent of voters opposed it and 39 percent supported it — was the first significant victory for social conservatives concerned about traditional values since the Supreme Court’s ruling in June established a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. Opponents called the measure’s defeat a blow to President Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, who both endorsed it, and a rebuke to the legacy of Ms. Parker, a Democrat, who is a lesbian and is in her final term as mayor of the country’s fourth-largest city.
Does Hillary want predators in the women's bathroom?
