Voters in Massachusetts will be asked
to uphold a recently enacted transgender law in 2018.
Massachusetts on Tuesday certified that
opponents of the law had gather enough valid signatures to put the
law up for a vote.
“They filed a sufficient number of
signatures last week, which puts the referendum on the ballot in
November of 2018,” a spokesperson for Secretary of the Commonwealth
William Francis Galvin told the Washington
Blade on Wednesday.
Governor Charlie Baker, a Republican,
signed the law in July after some hand-wringing.
The law prohibits discrimination based
on gender identity in public accommodations. A broader law approved
in 2011 that protects in the areas of housing, employment and credit
is not affected by the proposed referendum.
Kasey Suffredini of the LGBT rights
group Freedom Massachusetts predicted that voters would uphold the
law.
“The people of the Commonwealth have
a deep and long history of promoting fairness and inclusion,” he
said in a statement. “When presented with the question of whether
to continue to treat transgender people as equal members of the
Commonwealth in 2018, they will vote yes.”