Tennessee now has a hate crime statute protecting transgender people, according to an opinion Republican state Attorney General Herbert Slatery issued earlier this month. Slatery wrote this opinion responding to a question from State Rep. Mike Stewart, D-Nashville. Tennessee’s statute protecting transgender people is the first such one in the South, according to The Tennessean. Slatery’s spokeswoman, Samantha Fisher, said Monday she had no comment. “We have nothing more to add to the opinion issued to Rep. Stewart February 8th which can be found on our website,” Fisher told The Tennessee Star. According to the state attorney general’s website, the end of that opinion says the following: For purposes of the hate-crime enhancement, a crime committed against a person because that person manifests a gender that is different than his or her biological gender at birth—i.e. a crime committed against a person because he or she is transgender—is thus necessarily committed because of, at least in part, the person’s gender. Members of the Family Action Council of Tennessee condemned Slatery’s opinion. According to Factn’s website, the organization fights for religious liberty. “In arriving at this conclusion, the attorney general ignored the fundamental canon of statutory construction that courts are ‘to…
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