President Obama said society and circumstances, not he, made transgender bathroom use a national issue.
“I just wanted to emphasize to you … it’s not like I woke up one day and I said, ‘man, you know what we really need to do is? Let’s start working on high school bathrooms,'” Obama told an Elkhart, Ind., resident who asked during a town hall Wednesday why the Obama administration issued a memo on the subject.
“You know, I was thinking about ISIL” and the economy, Obama continued, using the administration’s preferred acronym for the self-proclaimed Islamic State. “But one of the things that, as president you learn, is that you don’t choose the issues all the time; the issues come to you. And then you have to make your best judgment about what you think is right.”
Obama agreed with the questioner, who asked if other priorities should take precedent.
“I didn’t make it an issue,” Obama responded. “There are a lot of things that are more pressing; you’re absolutely right.”
But the Education Department was fielding guidance requests from school districts across the country and had to respond, Obama said.
“And my answer is that we should deal with this issue the same way we’d want it dealt with if it was our child,” Obama said. “And that is to try to create an environment of some dignity and kindness for these kids. And that’s sort of the bottom line,” Obama said, noting these students who are “out in the open” are being “bullied” and “ostracized.”
Obama said he understood the man’s religious concerns, but that school administrators sought his advice.
“Now, I understand that people, you know, for religious beliefs or just general discomfort, might disagree,” Obama explained. “And I’m not the one who’s making a big issue of it. But if the school districts around the country ask me ‘What do you think we should do? Then what we’re going to do is tell them let’s find a way to accommodate them,” he said.
Obama’s remarks sparked an almost immediate response from North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, whose state the Obama administration is suing for its law banning cross-sex bathroom use by transgenders.
His office issued a press release challenging Obama’s claims about where the Education Department’s controversial guidance on the issue in schools emanated.
The “‘sweeping directive to public schools seemed to come out of nowhere,'” the release stated, quoting a recent New York Times story. “‘In fact, it was the product of years of study inside the government and a highly orchestrated campaign’ by liberal interest groups.”
