Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves and Mississippi Senate committee chairs.
AP / Rogelio V. Solis
The Republican-dominated Mississippi Senate voted 28-18 on Thursday in its final procedural act to advance what critics say is the most sweeping anti-LGBT legislation in the United States, allowing denial of products and services in a wide range of venues.
The night before, Senators voted 31-17 to pass the bill, then took up a motion that required Thursday's final vote.
The House must vote only once to concur, thereby sending it to the governor, because the House already passed a slightly different version of the bill by a 80-39 vote in February.
In speeches on the Senate floor Wednesday night, Republicans backers argued their legislation fixes problems created for people of faith when the Supreme Court ruled for marriage equality last year.
"It gives protection to those in the state who cannot in a good conscience provide services for a same-sex marriage," Sen. Jennifer Branning said in an address to her colleagues.
The bill would protect individuals, certain businesses, and religious organizations with religious objections to same-sex marriage or transgender people.
"I don't think this bill is discriminatory," she continued, saying the bill instead protects the rights of Christians from government retribution if they oppose same-sex couples getting married "It takes no rights away from anyone."
But Democrats fiercely contend the bill is overly broad, specifically targeting LGBT people for discrimination in numerous settings, thereby inviting backlash that other states, including North Carolina, have faced for passing laws targeting LGBT people.
“This is probably the worst religious freedom bill to date,” Ben Needham, director of Project One America, an LGBT advocacy project in the Deep South run by the Human Rights Campaign, told BuzzFeed News.
Critics widely argue the bill would explicitly allow the denial of services, goods, wedding products, medical treatment, housing, and employment to LGBT people.
Specifically, House Bill 1523 would protect individuals, religious organizations, and certain businesses who take actions due to their religious objections to same-sex marriage. It would also protect those who object to transgender people. The bill says they could not face government retribution if they were acting based on "sincerely held" religious beliefs.
Further, it covers those who decline for reasons of faith to provide counseling services, foster care, and adoption services — even, apparently, those receiving government funding. Clerks who issue marriage licenses could also recuse themselves.
Democratic Sen. John Horhn argued the bill was inherently discriminatory.
"I have experienced discrimination, as many African Americans have — can't you see how this legislation might be seen as discriminatory?" he challenged Republicans.
The Mississippi vote comes a week after North Carolina passed a law that targets LGBT rights, and the same week that Georgia's governor vetoed a religious protection bill under pressure from corporations threatening to pull business from the state.
If enacted, the Mississippi legislation would combine elements of lightning-rod Religious Freedom Restoration Acts (which restrict government from burdening exercise of faith) and First Amendment Defense Acts (which protect people opposed to same-sex couples marrying).
“This would be a new type of bill out there,” Needham said.
“It is very broad and very dangerous. It basically sanctions religious discrimination.”
On Wednesday, the Senate passed an amendment to the bill that would to restore governmental immunity against lawsuits, requiring the House to concur before it can reach the governor.
Gov. Phil Bryant did not immediately respond to BuzzFeed News' a request to comment on whether he would veto the measure or allow it become law if it reaches his desk.
However, Bryant told WLOX last week he doesn't think the bill is discriminatory.
"I think it gives some people as I appreciate it, the right to be able to say, 'That's against my religious beliefs and I don't need to carry out that particular task,'" he said.
The 13-page measure prohibits the government from “discriminating” against a person and certain organizations for acting on their religious convictions.
It defines “person” broadly — including “sole proprietorship, or closely held company, partnership, association, organization, firm, corporation, cooperative, trust, society or other closely held entity."
The government also could not penalize a religious organization for denying housing, employment, or services.
LGBT advocates protested in the Mississippi capitol.
AP / Rogelio V. Solis
The bill further protects those providing photography, poetry, videography, disc-jockey services, wedding planning, printing, floral arrangements, dress making, cake or pastry, artistry, wedding-venue rentals, limousine, car-service rentals, jewelry sales and services, or similar marriage-related services.
It would protect those who believe “sexual relations are properly reserved” to opposite-sex marriages, and that being male or female is “objectively determined by anatomy and genetics at time of birth.”
It goes on to cover those enforcing sex-specific policies for employee or student dress or grooming, or concerning access to restrooms, showers, dressing rooms, or locker rooms.
The bill then protects those who decline treatments, counseling, or surgeries related to sex reassignment or gender, identity transitioning — or declines to participate in psychological, counseling, or fertility services. The bill provides an exception for medical emergencies.
In defining “discriminating,” the bill says government could not fine, withhold loans, give bad grades, refuse to hire, or take dozens of other retaliatory acts against individuals acting on their faith.
The state has no law banning LGBT discrimination.
“It is very broad and very dangerous,” said Erik Fleming, the director of advocacy and policy for the ACLU of Mississippi, who also served for 11 years in the state House. "It basically sanctions religious discrimination.”
"It is reminiscent of what happened 50 or 60 years ago in this same state,” Fleming told BuzzFeed News. “People say that it is just religious, but there were people who had a religious belief that black and white people should be segregated, and you’re opening that Pandora’s box again.”
State Sen. Horhn warned about repeating that history.
"Why does this keep happening to Mississippi? Why do people keep thinking so badly of us?" he said.
"This is one of them," he said. "It's House Bill 1523 before us. They say it's about same-sex marriage. If that's the case, why does it include adoptions? Then why does it allow discrimination in medical services? The reason we are so adamantly opposed to it is because we have already been there."
"Ladies and gentleman, we don't need to pass this legislation. We don't need to put another stain on Mississippi."