NC Democrats squirm over effort to recognize two sexes (06-26-2025--Hour2)

What's going on. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to dpeteclendershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button. Get every episode for free right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support. So, the North Carolina Senate passes a bill, according to the w r A L headline, passes a bill targeting gender public school discussions. It was actually it was a bill to you know, address women and minor exploitation online crack down on some of these the sextortion scams that people are doing against a lot of young boys. Actually they'll meet them in gaming chat rooms and such and the little the like if you're playing a multiplayer online game with other people, they pose as as young kids and then they get them to send they you know, they take to a private chat they're like, oh, send me some picks and whatever, and then they get the kid to do, you know, send a picture of a you know them naked or something, and then they say, all right, I'm going to send this to everybody. If you don't send me money, I'm going to share it online. I'm gonna do all this. I'm gonna ruin your life. And this is an attempt to crack down on that behavior. It's also an attempt to crack down on like human trafficking that is occurring on these websites, the porn websites and stuff. You know, sets criteria for you know, written consent and age verification of all the people in the videos, and you know, if anybody complains they want their stuff taken down, you have to comply within seventy two hours. They're ten thousand dollars a day fines attached to stuff. So it's an attempt to get at that. And that was the original bill that came out of the House, that was unanimous in the House, went to the Senate, and then the Senate added several provisions. I went over them in the last hour. Definitions of male and female, boy and girl, man and woman. And this, of course now has got the Democrats outraged. The bars state prisons from using state taxpayer funds to pay for sex reassignment surgery. For inmates, their identification or the ID documentation stuff. I did mention this last hour. Let me go ahead and try to find it here in the bill. It's cause of action for malpractice. You get shelby. So a ten year clock starts running if you want to sue if you went you know, through surgeries, transition surgeries and stuff, and you want to sue because you feel you were harmed. The clock runs for ten years, and it starts from the time of discovery by the injured party of both the injury and the causal relationship between the treatment and the injury. Okay, so ten years. And my reading of that is it's not simply when the surgery occurred. If you then figure out five years after the surgery occurred, or let me say, eleven years after the surgery occurred, that now you're like, whoa this, I should never have had this done. I think the clock would start running at that point, from the moment you realize that there's a causal relationship between the treatment and the injury. Wil simply said it was after the treatment or the surgery, and I don't think that's the case. My reading of the legislation and a medical professional or entity may not seek a contractual waiver of this liability, so you cannot wave this away. You can be held civilly liable for this. I'm looking for the part about the here it is. It's the last section. When the sex of a person is changed on an amended or new birth certificate issued, the state registrar shall attach the new certificate to the certificate of birth then on file, and shall preserve both certificates as a multi page document. The state Registrar shall forward a copy of the new certificate to the Register of Deeds of the county of birth. The Register of Deeds of that county of birth shall attach the new certificate to the copy of the certificate of birth that's on file. The Register of Deeds shall preserve both certificates as a multi page document. And thereafter, when a certified copy of the certificate of birth of the person is shoot, it shall be a copy of the multi page document. Okay, So it's saying if somebody has a sex change operation, they now you know, I'm living my life as the alternate sex and I want a new birth certificate. Or I came from a state that issued me a new birth certificate. Your file is going to have two birth certificates, and I'm fine with that. Unlike the WRAL story where it says require transgender North Carolinians to use their original birth certificate and official transactions. I don't did I read anything that said that, so I don't really know. I mean, maybe they're just ripping off of the Democrat press release on that. I'm not really sure. Okay, So that's what the Senate added. They added a bunch of these provisions. There's some school library related stuff too. So Democrats are all outraged about this because they wanted to vote for the anti sex store legislation, as their colleagues over in the House did, but now they're not going to be able to because they're going to be seen as anti trans right and they can't do that. But they can't say no. They don't want to vote no either because if they vote no, then they could be accused of being anti sextortion, like, oh, you're not protecting the kids from sextortion, right, Oh, what to do? Yes, that's what happens when you run so far out that you're you're, you know, way out of the boundaries of the of the norm, and you're afraid of being punished because your base is way out there beyond the boundaries of the norm. Here is Senator Sophia Chitlick. That's her name. She's from Durham and she is a Democrat. My Democratic colleagues and I remain focused on protecting women and girls along with many of you, which is why we actually filed dozens of bills this year. What's a woman or a girl? You don't want those definitions, but yet you claim to be see because they will say a woman and a girl is also a boy who identifies as a girl. So we're protecting that person too, that boy, but we're also protecting women and girls because that boy is also a girl. See, makes perfect sense. To do just that. None of those bills involved denying trans, intersex and non binary people the ability to live with dignity. This bill doesn't do that either. There's nothing in here that undignifies anybody. There isn't. But this is all the Democrats have, are these empty hollow slogans. Because that is inherently in conflict with the goal of protecting all women. Unfortunately, again, none of these bills made it out of committee. The good news is that it's not too late to tackle the sexual exploitation of women and girls, and of course of young men as well. We have a great process to do that, and a lot of people in this room who again care deeply about. Women and girls, but we just can't define what those are. This is the insanity, right that you end up when you start promoting insane vocabulary changes, when you adopt insane ideology, and then you try to argue, you can't argue from a logical, sane perspective. It's not working. And it's a point that was not lost on the Republicans in that chamber either. Here's the part about the schools. There are a couple things. Local boards of education shall adopt policies that do all of the following. Provide ongoing public access through a searchable web based catalog to the titles of any library books available at each school within that school administrative unit. Each school shall display its catalog on the home page of its website. Okay, so you'll be able to see every book that libraries are stocking on the shelves at your kid's school, and the district will have a list of all the books that are available in all schools. Also, the district shall allow a parent or guardian of a student to identify any library book that may not be borrowed by the student. A student shall not be permitted to borrow any library books identified by the student's parent or guardian pursu into the subdivision. So, if I, as a parent, do not want my kid reading a particular book, I will tell the library, don't give my kid that book, do not let my kid check that book out, and then the school library must comply with that. And this is also an outrage to the Democrats. You'll hear some of their arguments, and they are stupid, all right. If you're listening to this show, you know I try to keep up with all sorts of current events, and I know you do too, And you've probably heard me say get your news from multiple sources. Why Well, because it's how you detect media bias, which is why I've been so impressed with ground News. It's an app and it's a website and it combines news from around the world in one place, so you can compare coverage and verify information. You can check it out at check dot ground, dot news slash Pete. I put the link in the podcast description too, I started using ground News a few months ago and more recently chose to work with them as an affiliate because it lets me see clearly how stories get covered and by whom. The blind spot feature shows you which stories get ignored by the left and the right. See for yourself. Check dot ground dot news slash pete. Subscribe through that link and you'll get fifteen percent off any subscription. I use the Vantage plan to get unlimited access to every feature. Your subscription then not only helps my podcast, but it also supports ground News as they make the media landscape more transparent. Another provision of this bill it would excuse students with religious objections to Local boards of education shall adopt policies to allow a student or the student's parent or guardian to request that the student be excused from specific classroom discussions, activities, or assigned readings that the student, parent, or guardian beliefs would impose a substantial burden on the student's religious beliefs or invade the student's privacy by calling attention to the student's religion. To the extent practicable, the local board of education shall provide advanced notice to students, parents, and guardians of the discussions, activities, or assigned readings. If a student is excused from a classroom in discussion activity or assigned reading, the school shall provide the student with an alternative activity or assignment aligned with the standard course of study. See again, this is all in reaction to the left's constant push of queer theory, critical race theory, right, like all of these leftist neo Marxist Graham Sheean long March through the institution crap. And so this is why the legislature is doing this stuff. It's to rain you in. You guys are supposed to be doing like the most basic, bland like lowest common denominator type of stuff in the schools, like teaching people how to read. But no, you use these as playgrounds for your activism. And so now, yes, here's the reaction. This is the HB two reaction to you guys going radical in the city of Charlotte with your bathroom ortnets. Right, that's how we get here. Also, you're not allowed to have students of opposite sex share sleeping quarters when you're on a school trip. Not allowed to do that unless it's like your sibling, if it's your brother or sister or whatever. Then you are allowed to do that, but if it's not your sibling, you don't get to assign the hotel rooms on the overnight trips. So all of this is obviously outrageous to Democrats here. Senator Greg Meyer, Democrat from Orange County, he opposed the bill because the North caro because of the id requirements on these sex identification. I think that one thing we can all agree on is that we want every North Carolinian, no matter who they are, to be able to have a safe place to live, a job that they can support their family, to be able to travel freely, all things that require a form of identification. And when we say that we want all North Carolinians to be able to do that, that means that we want transgender or intersexual North Carolinians to have the same ability to do that as everyone else they do. Other than that the ability to have those freedoms, most trans folks just want to be left alone by us. Yeah. Yeah, I'm not so sure about that anymore. Greg, I don't and I'm not so sure about that. When you're trying to force everybody to say certain things, do certain things, act certain ways, right, when you're like I'm going to win all of your medals and trophies and scholarships because I'm born a male and your born female. But I'm going to identify as a female, and I'm going to compete against you in your sports and take all of your scholarship money. That I'm not so sure that that's just you wanting to be left alone, you know, a little bit of the difference. And I say that as as like a tea party guy, lowercase libertarian, very much would like to be left alone. So it's always interesting to hear Democrats talking about respecting people who want to be left alone, because they literally do not do that in anything else. By everybody else. This bill makes it harder for them to pursue the freedoms that all of us enjoy and all of us, I think, believe that everyone should have. And so i'd encourage you to vote against this bill given the way that it would restrict freedom for those members of the North Carolina community. Thank you. Okay, it doesn't restrict anybody's freedom, So here is Terrence Everett, Democrat from Wait County, said the law does not define what a religious objection is, which would allow students to be excused from classroom discussions that the parent believes would be a quote substantial burden. So it's not just a trifling right. It's a substantial burden. But the law doesn't define it. So oh my gosh, Like, what what else could happen? What kind of abuses here could have been? There's no mainstream religion that teaches that exposure to an idea or learning is somehow a burden on your faith. Yeah, I'm not so sure about that either, dude. There's one particular religion mainstream that comes to the top of my mind where they're not too cool with education, particularly for women, which I can define for you. It's in the bill here. Now, Christianity, not Judaism, Islam, well out my God, not Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, or really every single one of those religions prizes education. Yeah, no, it doesn't. Not Islam, dude, particularly as it's practiced in like I don't know most of the Muslim world. Okay, maybe not most half, let's say half, how about the Middle East? That's what I mean. The absurdity of these arguments, this is Western conceit, this idea that oh they think just like us. There are a lot of people that don't. Man, they really don't, and learning. That language does not reflect an actual theological concern, but rather a political strategy. It's not about protecting faith. No religion actually needs to be protected from education. So instead of supporting parents and teaching our kids, schools has now created an opt out bureaucracy based on fear. As a public school parent, I just want my kids to be able to go to school and learn. What you want them to learn. How about this, What if they were teaching the kids that homosexuality was a sin? Would you object to that? Of course you would, right, of course you would. Well what about the people who think it is a sin and they're being taught their kids are being taught the opposite. Oh, we see, that's because we are right, thinks the Democrat. That's what I mean. Stop dealing with this stuff, Stop putting it into the curriculum, Stop trying to enforce these new ways of thinking onto everybody else's kids. If you stop that, you don't see these reactions. Without constant interruption from other people's political agendas. And if along the way my kids learn that there are gay people in the world, I'm okay with that. Ah see, there you go. Oh, I'm just learning. My kids are just learning that there are gay people in the world. That's all. This is doing nothing more. I don't want to burst anyone's bubble, but all of our kids and all of our grandkids are going to figure that out eventually. And when they do, I hope they have the education that sets them up for something more in life than just spending their time attacking other people's kids. What a what a straw man. Yeah. As much as the far right would like to talk about public schools pushing political agendas, this bill is a political agenda. Yeah, public schools are political, buddy. You know how? You know why? Because it's a government school. How do you think the policies get set. It is political. It's always been political. Do not whiz on my boots and tell me it's raining. Here's a great idea. How about making an escape to a really special and secluded getaway in western North Carolina? Just a quick drive up the mount and cabins of Asheville. Is your connection. 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Right, So, like, oh, don't tell me you can't judge a book by its cover. I don't need to know what's in the book because I know the title of the book, and I've read the research from the people who have read the book, and they say this is inappropriate, and they'll show me some pictures of what's in the book, and no, that's inappropriate. Age appropriate material is what we're talking about. But you don't want parents to know the books on the shelves of their own kids' schools. You want to blind parents to what their kids are learning. That's the point. It is indoctrination. It is getting them comfortable with ideas, making them doubt things about themselves, being told this is totally normal when it hasn't been, but you want it to be. Give me the generation. I will give you the revolution. And it turns teachers and librarians into compliance officers. And we're turning parenting into essentially a search filter. No, which is how you use Amazon. So do parents, by the way, do parents do search filters for the movies and the shows that their children watch. If I'm a parent and I take my kid to a bookstore to buy books, do I apply any kind of a filter at that point of sale? Of course I do. Of course parents do that, But you are trying to blind them. It's not how you raise a kid. Yeah, commerce there are a group I think Moms for. Liberty, oh Boogodie. Yelling about you know, warning us to know what our kids are reading. I do appreciate the advice. I know what my kids are reading because I talk to my kids. I don't rely on the school to provide me. Cliff notes on parenting to know what's going on in their lives. We have so little time with our kids. It is so finite where we get to find out what's going on in their lives. We should not be passing that off to schools or to legislators. And if your kids aren't talking to you, maybe they're not ready, and that's okay. But don't worry. We've got some blue hair gender queer expert at the school. They'll talk to your kid. They'll get nice and cozy with your kid, because your kid may not want to talk to you because you're not ready, or maybe they're not ready. But I'm a good parent because I know everything my kid is reading. Do you do you know every website your kid's going to, every TikTok video they watch? Do you know all of that? Really, even the best parents have a hard time tracking all of this stuff. But you can catch the underlying tone, which is I'm a better parent than you. And this is really an effort to empower moms for liberty. Those monsters who just want to know what's being given to their kids. Maybe they don't think you're ready. Either way, Parental rights, just like every other right, comes with responsibility. And it's a responsibility that can't be outsourced to a search engine or to a media specialist. And that's actually not what's happening here at all. It is putting the responsibility on the parent because they're saying, here are all the books, and then it's up to the parent to look at the list of books and to say I don't want my kid reading those books, or to say I don't have any problem with my kid reading those See, he's got it exactly backwards. But again, I sympathize with the left and trying to argue this stuff because it's completely illogical and irrational to make the arguments. I would have a very difficult time making these kinds of arguments because they are so stupid. Lisa Grafstein. Oh, by the way, there is one other thing here. What if your kid doesn't tell you? What if your kid is hiding stuff from you? Right? What then? How is a parent supposed to know this stuff? Oh, don't worry. To folks like Terrence Everett, that's okay. Also right, it's okay to keep stuff from your parents. You should keep secrets from your parents about this kind of stuff. And that's actually not good parental advice at all. But he's assuming he knows everything that his kids are doing. That's quite an assumption. And what I would say about that, Hang on a second. This is Lisa grafsteam Democrat from Wake. She says it's inappropriate to inject these definitions of male and female into law. And what I would say about that is it's really not appropriate. You know, we've eliminated the idea of debate and differences of opinion. We've outlawed so called divisive concepts in schools and in our public employment. But what this bill is doing is is picking an ideology to put into law. And it's not mine, and that's my objection. That's what's going on here. You've got the right that is fighting back and saying you do not control the culture. Your efforts have have been noted, right, we have now started to dismantle your project. And that's why they're upset is because this project has been underway for a very long time. We've been talking about like we talked about HB two god knows what ten years ago. That's when this stuff started really first percolating. It's been a decade, but it started way before that. It's just now reached a boil and people are fighting back. You know, stories are powerful. They help us make sense of things, to understand experiences. Stories connect us to the people of our past while transcending generations. They help us process the meaning of life and our stories are told through images and videos. Preserve your stories with Creative Video. Started in nineteen ninety seven in Minhill, North Carolina. It was the first company to provide this valuable service, converting images, photos and videos into high quality produced slide shows video albums. The trusted, talented and dedicated team at Creative Video will go over all of the details with you to create a perfect project. Satisfaction guaranteed. Drop them off in person or mail them. They'll be ready in a week or two. 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Senate Leader President pro Tem Burger made a motion that under rule twenty nine E, anybody who voted present would be excused from voting on the bill, and that means you can't vote on any amendment to the bill or any vote on the bill ever, again, which means what veto override, You would not be able to vote if the governor veto's it. So Democrats didn't want that either, So then they had a recess. Everybody like pow wowed and that I talked about what the strategy would be. They recess, they come back, and that's when Democrats try another tactic. I'm moving to adjourn until June thirtieth at noon, and I'll tell you why uh uh whoao, Because if we allow this rule to be exercised twenty nine E, that forces the silencing of an entire caucus. That is an assault on the democratic process. A raven for what purpose? Do your A motion to adjourn is non debatable motion. Yeah, so shut up, Michael Garrett, Democrat from Guilford. That's essentially what he said. It's not debatable. You made a motion to adjourn. That's it. You don't get to debate it. Okay, it's a non debatable motion, and it's not silencing you. You're the guys who said president, you silenced yourselves. Good grief man. That motion, by the way, failed, So then they had to settle the issue of whether their votes of president should be counted as an excused absence. Here's Sidney Batch. None of the members who actually voted president asked for an excuse absence. In our rules, it says that a member shall vote. It does not, in our rules say that they shall vote yay or nay. It says they shall vote okay. So that was their argument from Sidney Batch. Democrat Minority Leader Ralph Hyes from I think he's out of Mitchell County maybe anyway, he said there are only three options for senator to vote, and present is not one of them. I think it is evidently clear that votes in the Senate are recorded as yes or no. Notice you have a green button and a red button, not an extra whatever I came up with today button that's coming in we call for call for the eyes and nose is also an option that exists within our rules. The alternative to give voting yes or no under our rules is to be excused from voting. We saw Senator Bergen with a deal dealing with car dealerships, send forth to be excused from voting. At the point he sends forth his excuse from voting, he is excused from voting. Those are the options under the Senate rules. Each member who did not vote's name was called three times they refused to vote. Well, now under this motion, give them the option for the only alternative in the Senate when they derelicted their duty to vote, which is the name of the rule for the Senate that they all voted for when the rules were passed, that we are giving the option that we would declare that they are excused from voting. Those are the options of the Senate. So Democrats then argued, well, one member of the Senate cannot excuse another member under the rule. Only I can excuse myself. Okay, so now it looks like we're going to need another rule. I guess right. We're going to have to now because Democrats keep playing these games. We're going to now have to have a rule that says yes or no only. That's it, no present right to make any non excused vote. This is how you end up member the city council. They took those votes behind closed doors, and some people who left the meeting, and then their vote got counted as a YA in favor of the settlement for the police chief, and everybody was It's like, well, why would they automatically get a vote as a yes. This is why you get lawmakers that play these stupid games, and then you end up having to write a rule that somehow limits the stupid game from being played. But here's something else. Senator Benton Sorry from Johnston County Republican. He cited the state Constitution. Here, the ya's and kna's up on any question shall be taken and entered upon the journal. There's no further option. It's a constitutional obligation. It's a statutory obligation. We have the duty to record our vote. It's important for our constituents to know where we stand and not just simply vote present. There you go. It's in the state Constitution. You record the ya's and the knas. That's it. No present, you don't get to decide. I'm just present. I don't want to take a hard vote, so I'm just going to vote present. But once again, Democrats have no limiting principles here. There's nothing that stops them from going over the cliff. There's no guardrail there, they can never go to far are. So they will constantly manipulate and try all of these different tactics in order to not get jammed up for their own political skins. And so now they're going to have to pass another rule. I guess that says. To be clear, Democrats, this is what the rule says. You have to vote yes or no. There is no present, there's no abstaining. There's an excuse you can do. I have an excuse. You can take a walk and leave. But that's it. Then Senator Batch said, well, the original law from like two hundred years ago lays out a penalty for failing to fulfill your obligation to vote. What it does say if we don't actually move, and we don't and we don't discharge our duty, which I assume that my colleagues are saying today, it's a ten dollars fine. I have ten dollars for every single one of the members in my caucus who voted present. I will dispense with this and give it to the clerk so that we can put this to bed. It is a ten dollars fine, and I have twenty bills in front of me. There you go. It's kind of briby, a little bit, just a little bit briby. All right. That'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, so if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to dpetecleanershow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.