California is restricting publicly funded travel to four more states because of recent laws that leaders here view as discriminatory against gay and transgender people.
All totaled, California now bans most state-funded travel to eight states.
The new additions to California’s restricted travel list are Texas, Alabama, Kentucky and South Dakota.
They join Kansas, Mississippi, North Carolina and Tennessee as states already subjected to the ban.
California Attorney Xavier Becerra announced the new states at a Thursday press conference, where he was joined by representatives from ACLU Northern California and Equality California.
“We will not spend taxpayer dollars in states that discriminate,” Becerra said.
California’s Legislature last year voted to restrict state-funded travel to states with laws that allow businesses to deny services to gay and transgender people.
California’s law gained attention after North Carolina enacted its so-called “bathroom bill,” which prevented local governments from adopting anti-discrimination ordinances and required that people using bathrooms in public buildings choose the restroom that corresponds to their gender at birth.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott this month signed a law that allows child welfare providers to deny services because of “sincerely held religious beliefs,” a provision that critics interpreted as permitting adoption agencies to deny services to gay families.
Alabama and South Dakota were added to California’s listed of banned states because of similar adoption-related laws. The California Department of Justice said Kentucky’s Senate Bill 17 allows student-run organizations in schools to discriminate against classmates.
The California law includes exemptions for law enforcement officers, tax auditors and training events that are required for grants. California’s tax-collecting Board of Equalization has an office in Houston.