NEW YORK, February 14, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) -- New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo issued an executive order last week banning the state from awarding jobs to contractors who do not specify transgenders and homosexuals as a special protected class.

“Today I’m signing an executive order prohibiting New York state government from doing any business with any entity that discriminates against any New Yorker,” Cuomo declared, referring to transgenders and homosexuals.

His 177th gubernatorial decree, entitled “Prohibiting State Contracts with Entities that Support Discrimination,” states, “New York State’s government will not do business with entities that promote or tolerate discrimination or infringement on the civil rights and liberties of New Yorkers.” The order does not define “discrimination” or “harassment.”

State governmental agencies must not, under Cuomo’s command, contract with businesses that “fail to address the harassment and discrimination of individuals on the basis of their … sexual orientation, gender identity” and other characteristics.

The order says it is to be observed in “the provision of public goods, services, and accommodations, the educational environment, the workplace, and the provision of health care and insurance services.”

Speaking at the annual Human Rights Campaign Gala in New York City, where he unveiled the executive order, Cuomo announced that he was spearheading an effort to counteract Trump administration protections for religious liberty.

“I believe we need to move forward on our ‘equality’ agenda more aggressively than ever before,” the liberal Catholic governor said.

In the order, Cuomo directs his administration to release “guidelines” identifying restricted businesses.

Additionally, those businesses that contract with the state must sign a litmus test vowing in “a binding agreement” not to do business themselves with any company that does not have a homosexual/transgender anti-discrimination policy.

The governor’s dictate portends to “ensur(e) that no one infringes on the civil rights and liberties of (New York) citizens and residents,” but it nowhere mentions the rights of Christians or other religious citizens who disagree with transgender ideology.

Ed Mechmann, the Archdiocese of New York’s director of public policy, blogged that Cuomo’s executive order could be used to destroy religious liberties. “The Governor’s new order is rooted in animosity towards religious freedom,” Mechmann wrote.

Cuomo also took aim against the Trump administration, accusing it of “abdicat(ing) its responsibility to protect individuals from discrimination.”

“Trump’s Department of Education and Justice Department rescinded (Obama’s) instructions that schools must respect the gender identities of transgender students,” Cuomo said, referring to the current administration taking back Obama’s financially forced transgender bathroom mandate against public schools.

“Any school that refuses to protect transgender students will not receive a penny of state money -- and then they’re out of business,” Cuomo proclaimed to sustained applause.

He continued, “The Trump administration gave the Attorney General a license to discriminate by interpreting ‘religious liberty protections in the federal law.’ What that means is that a business can refuse to serve LGBTQ individuals because it violates their religious beliefs.”

This explanation is flawed, however, in that recent court cases have shown Christians happily serve anyone but refuse to participate in ceremonies that celebrate anti-Christian values.

Mechmann also took issue with the governor’s order citing ObamaCare’s forced abortion coverage mandate, which was rescinded by the Trump administration. Cuomo claims that rescission has “increased the vulnerability of LGBTQ rights.”

The idea that ‘LGBTQ rights’ might be ‘vulnerable’ (whatever that means) because of a decision relating to health insurance coverage of contraceptives is something that only an ideologue could believe,” Mechmann commented.

Cuomo sought to give his edict as much raw legal power as possible. His order states it “shall be interpreted broadly” and shall not be affected by limiting “federal executive branch interpretations.”

The governor also promised to introduce legislation that will “end” any legal strategy using homosexual harassment as a defense. The so-called “Gay Panic Defense” is based on the particularly repugnant nature of unwanted sodomic advances as a mitigating factor in a defendant’s knee-jerk reaction.

Cuomo, a communion-receiving Catholic who claims to adhere to the Christian faith, has been one of the leading champions of sodomy and homosexual “marriage,” as well as an enabler of gender dysphoria and promoter of transgender ideology.

Four years before the U.S. Supreme Court constitutionalized same-sex “marriage,” Cuomo passed a “Marriage Equality Act” that legally sanctioned homosexual relations as normal. In 2015, Cuomo added gender-confused individuals to state human rights protections. Last year, Cuomo started a government “Hate Crimes Task Force” to police private citizens’ words and actions, including a hotline for collecting accusations.

In 2017, Cuomo championed regulations giving fertility treatments to lesbians and unmarried women to have children who will never know their father. He additionally appointed the first openly homosexual judge to the New York Court of Appeals.