Missouri Bill Would Ban Many Companies From "Refusing To Deal With" Anti-Trans Businesses

stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to politics @lemmy.world – 246 points – Missouri Bill Would Ban Many Companies From "Refusing To Deal With" Anti-Trans Businesses
erininthemorning.com

The new bill comes after Andrew Bailey vowed to investigate companies pulling business from X, formerly Twitter over hate speech.

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First Amendment violation. Won't go anywhere.

Except that they can pass the bill, and enforce the bill, and the legislation stays active and in place until someone with standing files suit, goes to court (taking on the time and money expense of doing so), goes through the appeals process (and we know that the State could also appeal, so either way it goes), on and on until it gets to SCOTUS. All of which can take years, during which unconstitutional fuckery is foisted upon the good citizens of Missouri.

This is the standard that's been set: do whatever the fuck you want, and abuse the judiciary to get away with it as long as possible.

And, you're putting a lot of faith in the SCOTUS to actually do the right thing.

Yeah, I was describing the best case scenario.

Yeah the majority of SCOTUS has basically decreed that if an issue didn't exist at the time of the founding of the Constitution then it cannot apply.

It's very convenient when you can chuck out a solid 150 years of precedent and just pretend the intentions of a bunch of dead people. Fuck ethics and actually engaging with the wording of the law to dicern it's intention amirite?

Also worth noting that it takes someone or a group with enough time and deep enough pockets to tend it to court just to set everything straight.

until someone with standing files suit,

...and what that case will end up looking like is a company suing Missouri because Missouri won't buy shit from them because they in turn won't buy shit from companies that...aren't carbon neutral, or also work with the timber industry, or don't have enough PoC on their corporate boards, or w/e.

Last i checked there's already a law like this in Texas that forbids businesses who work with the state from boycotting Israel, oil and gas companies, or gun rights groups

Not necessarily, businesses would be free to not do business so long as they're not also contracted with the state. This refers to businesses contracted with the state, so it's more like the terms of their contract rather than an explicit rights issue.

Businesses doing business with the state would be required to also do business with these other groups or risk losing their contracts. That seems like a clear violation to me.

Describe?

Let's say my company wins the bid for a contact. Yay! But now one of my competitors checks and I haven't donated to the NRA and files suit saying I'm ineligible because I refuse to donate to them on a political basis. Now that's bullshit, but I have to pay a lawyer anyway to go to court and help me explain that it's bullshit.

In order to forestall that lawsuit, it's a lot cheaper to just give $50 or whatever to some right wing bullshit charities. It's only pocket change but I have to pay it to causes I don't support as a sort of insurance. Yet I can't turn around and file sit over someone who doesn't donate to planned parenthood. That's a hell of a double standard.

But it isn't, and it fits in line with the Civil Rights Act Title VI which prohibits businesses that work for the federal government from discriminating against certain classes. This is the same law, but at the state level. Speech is not curtailed unless you choose the option that requires curtailment.

Like I say, the business is free to not take state contracts then refuse business to whoever they like (just like the gay cake baker did), but if they want to work for the state they have to follow state rules.

What's the protected class in this case?

Apparently, transphobes

Read the bill.

It's several assorted industries, businesses that do not meet, are expected not to meet or do not commit to meet any particular environmental standard, employee compensation standard, board composition standard, or facilitating access to abortion, sex change, or transgender medical treatment. What exactly this entails is about a third of the bill: https://www.senate.mo.gov/24info/pdf-bill/intro/SB1061.pdf

So, if you refuse to deal with a company because that company doesn't have the right mix of demographics on their board, or works with the timber industry, or their health insurance doesn't cover trans HRT, then the State of Missouri won't use you as a vendor.

Is your position that people should be able to discriminate based on any identifying trait? Then you're against The Constitution, and you will lose in court.

Well that's the thing, sexual discrimination isn't really protected in the US outside of employment.

The US has:

  • 14th Amendment, which states the law must apply to everyone equally (so gay people can get married)
  • The Civil Rights Act, which contains various Titles:
    • Title II, which prevents businesses in hospitality or operating across state lines from discriminating over race, color, religion, or national origin
    • Title VI, which prohibits businesses working for the federal government from discriminating over race, color, or national origin
    • Title VII, which prohibits employers from discriminating over race, color, religion, sex, or national origin

I'm actually in 2 minds about whether the 1st Amendment would prevent this. One the one hand, there is a clear gap in the Federal law that State law should be able to fill. On the other, that gap was exactly the same thing as the gay cake baker successfully challenged against.

What if I just don't want to donate to the NRA? What if I just decide not to advertise on Twitter? Maybe I can say either of those decisions are for financial reasons, but in the long run it'll cost me more in lawyers fees to prove it than give them some token amount of money. That doesn't seem right, particularly the lack of requirements to do business with companies politically aligned on the other end of the spectrum.

As someone who occasionally works government contracts this isn't an academic question for me, though at least I can prove I don't advertise anywhere. I can't claim politically neutral donations, though. I frequently donate to queer-youth-focused charities (although they don't verify that they refuse to help conservative teen queer-folk, so maybe they are considered neutral?) and never to right-wing causes.

Edit: phone really ate up the end of this post and I was too rushed to reread. Mostly fixed now probably..

Well that's just the futility of banning boycotts. Unless someone actually says they're boycotting, you'd have almost no way of proving that they were.

What if I just don’t want to donate to the NRA? What if I just decide not to advertise on Twitter? Maybe I can say either of those decisions are for financial reasons, but in the long run it’ll cost me more in lawyers fees to prove it than give them some token amount of money. That doesn’t seem right, particularly the lack of requirements to do business with companies politically aligned on the other end of the spectrum.

Those are fine by this law.

What this law actually does would be closer to if you refused to do business with another company because **that ** company donates to the NRA, then the State of Missouri refuses to use you as a vendor.

Removing any free choice would be a violation of first amendment rights. People can NOT participate in what is mentioned here, but you can't force them to participate.