To the honorable Senator Rob Portman:

As a woman and a North Carolina citizen, I read with bemused interest (I can’t say “great” interest, because, frankly, I have as much a stake in Ohio as you have in North Carolina) your interview with the Washington Examiner this weekend.

I found this portion of the interview particularly amusing:

“I don’t know the details, but from what I know about it, it seems to me what the governor signed was a bad law,” Portman said. “That there’s an opportunity to protect people’s religious liberty and also not discriminate against people. And this law falls on the side of the discrimination side.

I’m a religious liberty supporter — I strongly believe in that,” Portman said, pointing to the Utah’s law enacted in 2015 protecting gays and religious believers from discrimination, which he said “found that right balance.”

Now, because I have only a passing interest in Ohio politics, only as it pertains to our nation as a whole, I can’t honestly say I know a lot about you, Senator. I know you helped Mitt Romney prepare for his debates against Obama in the 2012 election year.

Great work, Sir.

I’m totally not being sarcastic. At all.

I know you’re running for re-election. How’s that going?

I appreciate that you’re a religious liberty supporter. Had a lot of opportunity to stand for the religious liberties of your citizens there in Ohio? I may have missed it.

I ask these questions because it seems we both have a deficit of knowledge. The difference is, I’m not giving interviews that could be seen on a relatively large scale about things I admittedly have no knowledge of. It would seem that a man in your position would like to have some knowledge of what he’s speaking about before giving an interview. At the very least, defer any questions about a state that you have no stake in to those who actually possess an understanding of the subject.

Senator, let me just help you out, so that in the event you are asked at some later date about North Carolina’s HB2 (Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act), you won’t be put in a position to speak out on an issue that does not concern you or your constituents.

House Bill 2, now known as the Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, is not a religious liberty bill. North Carolina actually entertained a religious liberties bill a year ago, but Governor McCrory saw fit to veto the bill (the NC legislature overturned the veto in June of 2015). HB2 was a response to a broadly worded ordinance by the Charlotte, NC city council, that would have made all bathrooms and shower rooms in the city open to either sex. This was a gross act of local level government overreach, that put women and children at risk of predatory behavior in what should be the most private of places.

This was never meant as a move to discriminate against anyone. It was meant to keep men in the men’s bathrooms and shower rooms, and women in the women’s bathrooms and shower rooms. Because the LGBT community are desperate to be seen as victims, which means forcing their worldview on the rest of the community, no matter the cost, they latched on to this bill. They, the perpetually aggrieved progressive warriors of the left, and their squishy, moderate subordinates have turned this law into something it was never intended to be.

It’s not that Governor McCrory or his administration have not made attempts to clear up the misconceptions about the law to the public. They have, time and again.

You probably missed those attempts. I understand. You’re probably busy with things that concern Ohio, just as our law makers are busy with things that concern North Carolina – like this law and taking care of North Carolina’s citizens.

So, Senator Portman, I do hope this has cleared up, at least in part, any misconceptions you had. I hope that you now understand the difference between a religious liberty bill and a common sense bill passed to protect North Carolina’s women and children from predators that would have taken advantage of the “gender neutral” bathroom policies the city of Charlotte attempted to foist on the citizens.

I would leave you with this last thought, Senator. Ohio, like every other state in the nation, has its own issues to work through. Maybe your focus should be on Ohio and in serving your fellow Buckeyes. North Carolina is a pretty resilient state. We neither seek nor require outside permission to take care of our citizens.

Good luck with your campaign.