AUSTIN – Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, weighing in on a national controversy over restroom use by transgender people, said Tuesday he supports keeping men out of women's bathrooms, even if it takes legislation to do so – a signal to Texas legislators who want to pass a bill on the issue next legislative session.

"I think the handwriting is on the bathroom wall: Stay out of the ladies' room if you're a man," the conservative Republican said outside his Capitol office. "If it costs me an election, if it costs me a lot of grief, then so be it. If we can't fight for something this basic, then we've lost our country."

Later in the day, the former Houston talk-radio host added a petition to his campaign website blasting companies and politicians who oppose his view on the issue.

Controversy over the issue blew up in North Carolina recently after conservative lawmakers there approved a bill to require transgender people to use the restroom that corresponds to the sex listed on their birth certificates.

Similar legislation has triggered opposition in South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, Minnesota and other states.

It became an issue in the GOP presidential race last week when Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said men should be kept out of women's restrooms, and front-runner Donald Trump said people should be allowed to use whichever restroom they feel comfortable, a comment that prompted backlash from conservative factions of the party.

Patrick, who with Gov. Greg Abbott and other GOP officials last year supported the repeal of Houston's anti-discrimination ordinance over the issue, dismissed threats of boycotts and business opposition in other states as "bluff and bluster." He noted that since Houston voters repealed the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, known as HERO, the city has hosted the NCAA Final Four basketball championship and will host the Super Bowl in 2017.

"This issue is so clear and simple that it defies belief," he said. "Do they really want a man walking into a restroom with their daughter or mother or wife? … Have we gone to far in the world of political correctness that we've forgotten common sense, common decency?"

State Rep. Celia Israel, D-Austin, and other opponents of similar "potty bills" that did not pass during the 2015 legislative session said Patrick's remarks indicate a new fight is looming on an issue they say is more about discrimination than public safety.

"That party is saying they represent traditional families on this, but traditional families care more that foster children in our care are dying, and about a public school system that continues to be dragged through the courts …This party that wants to get the government out of people's lives wants to tell people which bathroom they can use? That doesn't make a lot of sense."

'Dog-whistle' issue

In last year's legislative session, two bills filed by state Rep. Debbie Riddle, R-Tomball, would have made it a crime to enter a public restroom or locker room not designated for a person's biological sex at birth. Two more filed by Rep. Gilbert Peña, R-Pasadena, would have permitted a bystander to sue a transgender person who used a prohibited bathroom for up to $2,000, in addition to compensation for "mental anguish."

None passed.

"It clearly shows that he lacks an understanding of who transgender people are," Ed Smith, CEO of Equality Texas, said of Patrick's remarks. "A transgender woman is a woman, and the safest place is for her to use a woman's restroom. … Everyone's got to pee, and they've used the bathrooms they're comfortable with for a long time, and they don't need the Legislature to tell them which bathroom they can use."

According to estimates from the Williams Institute, a research center at the UCLA School of Law, about 700,000 transgender people are in the United States, and approximately one-tenth of 1 percent of Texans.

"Being bad on LGBT issues is bad for business," said Ed Espinoza, executive director of Progress Texas, a Democratic advocacy group. "But LGBT issues are dog-whistle issues for conservatives … like abortion and guns in schools. They mobilize rabid primary voters, but do little to address the real issues facing the state."

Tuesday developments in Austin came as activists who fought to defeat the Houston ordinance held a news conference at a Galleria-area Target to announce their support for a boycott of the chain, following its announcement last week that it will allow customers to use the restroom or fitting room that corresponds to their gender identity in a move applauded by transgender advocates.

Target boycott

An American Family Association petition to boycott the chain had more than 700,000 signatures by Tuesday, petition supporters said.

"We want to send a message to the leaders of Target that there are a whole lot more individuals who believe in moral Christian values than the denigration of those values," said Steven Hotze, president of the Conservative Republicans of Texas, who was joined in supporting the boycott by anti-HERO advocate Jared Woodfill, who is running to become chairman of the Republican Party of Texas.

Hotze and Woodfill said they hope the boycott will force Target to change its policy, and influence support for a statewide law governing bathroom use in Texas.

The two were outnumbered at their announcement by a small group of transgender-rights supporters who booed the boycott and waved signs reading, "Thank You Target."

Target said it is standing by its policy.

"We certainly respect that there are a wide variety of perspectives and opinions," company spokeswoman Molly Snyder said. "As a company that firmly stands behind what it means to offer our team an inclusive place to work – and our guests an inclusive place to shop – we continue to believe that this is the right thing for Target."