For a lot of women, finding the right swimming suit is hard enough. But for one teenage girl, trying one on turned into a terrifying experience that could scar her forever. She was in a Target changing room with her mom, when she saw a 46-year-old “transgender” man looking over the partition at her unclothed body, videotaping her. Horrified, her mom ran after him to the parking lot, where he got in his car and sped away.

The man was ultimately caught, and last week, he confessed in court to “taking advantage of Target’s gender-inclusive policies” to gain access to girls like the 18-year-old he started filming. Although the man’s ex-wife did say that his gender confusion was a factor in their divorce, she agreed that he’s still attracted to women. Asked why he made the video, the man responded: “for the same reason men go online to look at pornography.” For the Target company, the headlines are another PR headache after a six-month string of them — brought on by the retailers’ decision to throw caution (and safety) to the wind and cast their lot with President Obama’s radical bathroom policy.

Now, a 1.4-million person boycott later, their brand isn’t the only thing suffering. Target’s stock has slumped more than $15 a share, and the business’s Chief Financial Officer Cathy Smith has already admitted that getting traffic in their stores has been the “number one challenge.” Now that sexual predators are coming clean that they’re targeting Target for their lax policies, the company’s numbers have nowhere to go but down. Suddenly, Governor Pat McCrory’s (R-N.C.) stance doesn’t seem so controversial after all. In fact, analysts are crediting McCrory’s sudden rise in the polls to the fact that he hasn’t given an inch on H.B. 2, a law that would make it a whole lot harder for perverts to gain access to teenagers like Idaho’s.

After trailing state Attorney General Roy Cooper (who is fully supportive of government forcing dangerous policies like Target’s upon private entities), McCrory has soared to within a half point of his opposition — largely, pollsters say, because he refuses to bend to the liberal bullies. Putting privacy above political correctness is something that North Carolina voters appreciate, based on the popularity of the law that the media has taken such delight in misrepresenting. “I don’t agree with the concept of redefining gender,” Governor McCrory has said. “That is major societal change, but it is being passed off as a political battle.” Liberal activists “have the media on their side,” he agreed, “and they have a lot of [public] support because people don’t understand the issue.”

That may be changing, as Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick (R) hints at passing something similar in Texas — where predators are also preying on local girls at Target stores. With the help of State Attorney General Ken Paxton (R), Patrick has been calling on Target to reconsider its decision since one of Texas’s own was victimized. “After this latest incident, I hope Target finally recognizes the importance of protecting its customers, especially in environments where they can be at their most vulnerable. I am offering them the resources of my office to help assist them in improving their safety procedures,” Paxton said. Stubbornly, the retailer has stood by its policy — obviously more concerned about its relationship with cultural elites than the safety and privacy of shoppers.

“Transgender people have obviously been going into the ladies’ room for a long time, and there hasn’t been an issue that I know of,” Lt. Governor Patrick told a Dallas crowd late last week. “But, if laws are passed by cities and counties and school districts allowing men to go into a bathroom because of the way they feel, we will not be able to stop sexual predators from taking advantage of that law, like sexual predators take advantage of the internet.” In response, he’s already working on a bill similar to North Carolina’s that gives the state the authority to set bathroom policies. He’s calling the legislation the Women’s Privacy Act and hopes that the move will help beat the drum against President Obama’s school bathroom edict. “We’re not gonna let boys and girls shower together,” Patrick vowed during his speech. “Not on my watch.”

Originally published here.

Trump on the Stump

It’s difficult to imagine a time in our nation’s history when Americans were more divided than they were during the Civil War. With the United States on the brink of near-extinction, and brother fighting brother, the future could not have looked bleaker than when President Abraham Lincoln took to the hallowed grounds of Gettysburg, stained with the blood of thousands of men, to begin the long road back to healing.

On Saturday, 28 presidents removed from the one who delivered what many consider to be the greatest political speech in American history, Donald Trump returned to that battlefield to deliver remarks of his own. Hoping to make one last case for his candidacy, he released a “Contract with the American Voter” outlining his first acts as president to “restore security and the constitutional law.” His agenda for the first 100 days — replacing Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court, overturning this White House’s unconstitutional executive orders, canceling funding for sanctuary cities, enforcing immigration laws, and initiating “extreme vetting” of people entering the U.S. — is an ambitious start to undoing the damage of the Obama years. “Hillary Clinton is not running against me. She is running against change,” he said. “We will drain the swamp in Washington, D.C., and replace it with a new government of, by and for the people,” Trump promised, echoing Lincoln’s famous words. “That is why I have chosen Gettysburg to unveil this contract.”

Saturday’s speech came on the heels of one of the best arguments against partial-birth abortion the country has heard in a presidential debate, in which Trump described — in detail — the barbaric procedure that rips a child out of the womb moments before birth. To many people, it was a significant turning point in a campaign full of contrasts. As Kellyanne Conway, Trump’s campaign manager, said on Fox News, the choice doesn’t get any clearer than that.

“One is saying, ‘I’m pro-life, I will appoint pro-life judges.’ And then taking the case right to Hillary Clinton that her and her party are for abortion, anyone, anytime, anywhere. They’re incredibly extreme — sex selection abortion, fetal pain abortion, taxpayer funded abortion, and, of course, late-term abortion. Donald Trump said on live TV in front of you that Hillary Clinton would rip the baby from the womb, that it’s OK to have a late-term abortion. She had a terrible defense to that — that somehow it’s because of the life of the mother. And people say, well, there aren’t that many. There are 12,000 a year. Americans ought to know that’s part of being pro-choice. So, I was very excited. Let me tell you something. A lot of Republicans just hide under the desk hoping the abortion shrapnel won’t hit them and there was none other than a Manhattan billionaire giving impassioned defense of pro-life. It’s as simple as that.”

As with Lincoln, we can pray that under a pro-life president the 58 million unborn Americans shall not have died in vain. Until then, Trump had a warning for the millions of voters uncertain about what to do on November 8. “If they can fight somebody like me, who has unlimited resources to fight back, just look at what they can do to you — your jobs, your security, your education, your health care, the violation of religious liberty, the theft of your Second Amendment, the loss of your factories, your homes, and much more.” To see where the candidates stand on all of those issues — and more — check out FRC Action’s Presidential Voter Guide.

Originally published here.

U.S. Deals with Negative Side Infects of Obama

Chances are, Americans don’t go through their day worrying about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). But considering the panic, maybe they should at least consider the growing risk to our nation. According to the most knowledgeable experts on the issue, the spread of STDs may be the biggest crisis that no one knows about. Thanks to the Obama approach, the mess of sexual liberalism is hitting home in a nation that’s spent the last eight years not just encouraging, but funding messages of irresponsibility.

According to a new Centers for Disease Control (CDC) report, at least three STDs are hitting record highs. In just the last two years, the cases of chlamydia have climbed six percent, gonorrhea 13 percent, but syphilis takes the prize with a 19 percent hike since 2014. “We have reached a decisive moment for this nation,” said the CDC’s Dr. Jonathan Mermin. “STD rates are rising, and many of the country’s systems for preventing STDs have eroded. We must mobilize, rebuild, and expand services — or the human and economic burden will continue to grow.”

And the economic burden is nothing to sneeze at. Taxpayers sink more than $16 billion a year into treatments for these infections — most of them incurable, and all of them expensive. Amazingly, 15-24 year-olds, some of whom graduated from Obama’s school of sexual irresponsibility, accounted for more than 60 percent of chlamydia and half of all gonorrhea diagnoses. California lapped the competition in overall cases of STDs, forcing leaders back to the drawing board after years of throwing comprehensive sex ed at people (which the government just admitted has been a billion-dollar failure at teen pregnancy prevention).

What do we expect from an administration where sex is the focus of almost every public policy? This is Obama’s legacy!

Originally published here.

This is a publication of the Family Research Council. Mr. Perkins is president of FRC.