WILMINGTON — A local state legislator aims to enshrine legal marriages between those in the LGBTQ+ community in North Carolina as protections for the community erode at the federal level.
New Hanover County’s Rep. Deb Butler introduced two bills affecting the North Carolina General Assembly Monday. The bills are also sponsored by Phil Rubin (D-Wake), Jordan Lopez (D-Mecklenburg) and Mary Belk (D-Mecklenburg).
House Bill 174 asserts “marriage is the legally recognized union of two consenting individuals, regardless of sex, gender, or sexual orientation” and prohibits any individual or entity from refusing services related to marriage based on sex, gender or sexual orientation.
“You can’t force a cake-maker to write a message that they object to,” Butler said Tuesday, referring to a June 2023 Supreme Court case. A web designer refused to design a cake message for a same-sex couple because of her beliefs; the court affirmed the First Amendment protects the designer’s right to refuse to create messages they disagree with.
“This is to address the service itself, to suggest that you can’t discriminate when you’re offering services to the public.”
A similar bill, though also codifying the right to interracial marriage, was proposed in 2022 and received bipartisan support in the House of Representatives, though it stalled in the Senate.
Butler has simultaneously put forth a constitutional amendment repealing a provision recognizing marriage between one man and one woman. The provision was added in 2012, whereas prior same-sex marriage was not mentioned in the state Constitution. Though the prohibition remains on the books, it has been unenforceable since June 2015, when the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in Obergefell v. Hodges.
“The Supreme Court has become politicized, in my opinion,” Butler said. “It would be horrific, but should they revisit the Obergefell case, should they send this issue to the states, we need statewide protections here in North Carolina, because there are several provisions within our statutes that you know would predominate.”
Butler said the recent actions by the Trump administration — directing federal agencies to only recognize the two biological sexes, ending Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives — prompted her to be proactive in protecting marriage equality from changes on the national level.
Her bills have garnered support from Wilmington City Council member David Joyner, who agreed that same-sex marriage could be in jeopardy.
“As an attorney, I can see the smoke signals certain justices on the United States Supreme Court are sending,” Joyner wrote in a press release Tuesday. “If they’re planning to reverse the decisions which uphold marriage as a fundamental right, North Carolina should take the same steps as Virginia and proactively protect marriage equality at the State level.”
Republican Gov. Glenn Younkin signed into law House Bill 174, affirming the right of same sex couples to marry in 2024. In 2021, the state also started the process of removing its amendment prohibiting same-sex marriage from its Consititution, though it has not yet made it to voters’ ballots.
According to the Pew Research Center, more than 70% of Americans support the legalization of same-sex marriage; 61% of Americans say same-sex marriage as the negative perspective attributed more so to Republicans, though this divide is less pronounced among young Americans.
“For young people this is just such a rearview mirror issue,” Butler said.
Butler’s proposed amendment to the state Constitution would need approval from North Carolina voters if passed by the legislature and signed by Gov. Josh Stein. Butler acknowledged there’s a small percentage of that happening, as the state legislature is controlled by the GOP, but she said she always remains hopeful.
Butler pointed to her swearing in to the General Assembly in January 2019; the prior month her wife Anni Parra died from a brain aneurysm. Without Butler even knowing, the legislature, then as now controlled by Republicans, adjourned in the honor and memory of Parra.
“It is forever part of North Carolina history now that they adjourned it in memory of my same-sex marriage wife,” Butler said. “So how can they do something as kind and thoughtful as that and then turn around and do the hurtful things they do to the LGBTQ community?”
Though now repealed, the North Carolina General Assembly passed in 2016 a House Bill 2 — also dubbed “the bathroom bill” — the country’s first legislation requiring people to use the bathroom associated with their sex assigned at birth. After national pushback — including a canceled PayPal expansion and loss of NCAA championships, not to mention film productions that moved elsewhere — the bill was rolled back in 2017 but wasn’t repealed until 2020.
In the past few years, the GOP has used its supermajority to pass several bills addressing the LGBTQ+ community, including a “Don’t Say Gay” law prohibiting the discussion of gender identity and sexual orientation from kindergarten through fourth grade and requires school administrators to notify parents if their student has chosen to use a pronoun different from their assigned sex.
Butler said she has not discussed support of her two bills with her colleagues across the aisle; after it was read on the House floor Monday, it was referred to the House rule committee where “bills go to die,” Butler said.
However, Butler said she was prepared to file a discharge petition; if it gathers enough signatures, it would force the bill to be moved out of the rules committee. Butler pointed out she probably wouldn’t be able to get enough Republican votes for that to work either.
“The only way forward is for people to elect more thoughtful representatives,” Butler said. “We have the ability to sustain a veto now, and on some of these big social issues, I don’t think you’re going to see any Democrats waffle and so we’ll be able to prevent them from passing the worst things … I just want to make the community know, and the people that I represent know that love is love, and we’re not going to let these bigots take us back to the ‘50s.”
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