Dana Ferguson

dferguson@argusleader.com

Following a deadly mass shooting at an Orlando nightclub, South Dakota and a group of other states will move forward with a legal challenge to the Obama administration's guidance on school bathroom policies for transgender students.

Attorney General Marty Jackley on Tuesday said that he and more than a dozen other attorneys general still planned to file a lawsuit against the Obama administration as they believe the president's action was an overstep.

The news came a week after Jackley initially announced that he would join a coalition of other state's in opposing the policies and days after a mass shooting in Orlando, Fla. Forty-nine people were killed at a night club there early Sunday morning and dozens more were injured.

Civil rights groups and LGBT advocates have opposed the challenge to the guidance from the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Justice. In response to Jackley's statement, LGBT advocates said the challenge constitutes another act of discrimination against the LGBT community and could lead to more violence.

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Jackley said the attorneys working on the challenge to the Obama administration's blanket policy decided to wait to file their lawsuit, which will aim more at the president's executive authority than the potential constitutional problems with allowing transgender students to use certain facilities.

"Florida doesn't direct our decision, but certainly there is a sensitivity that we are respecting," he said. "As I've said, I think the president went too far in his executive action."

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He didn't say when the group would file its challenge, but said it could come before the Supreme Court if decisions in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals conflict.

American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota Executive Director Heather Smith said Jackley and the other attorneys' efforts to block the transgender guidelines marked a 'continued attack' on gay, lesbian and transgender people.

"We have seen recent political attacks on the LGBT community manifesting into literal acts of violence against them," Smith said. "The attorney general's commitment to this lawsuit is nothing more than a continued attack on the LGBT community and sends the harmful message that it's okay to target transgender students just for being who they are."

Ashley Joubert-Gaddis, Center for Equality director of operations, said challenges to Obama's policy and legislation like a so-called transgender bathroom bill brought up in the South Dakota Legislature are damaging to the state's LGBT community.

"We need people like the attorney general to stop spewing hate and intolerance," Joubert-Gaddis said. "When elected officials bring these bills or these challenges, it opens the door for people to be hateful."

Follow Dana Ferguson on Twitter @bydanaferguson

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