Confrontations have flared across America over whether to protect or block the ability of transgender people to use public restrooms that match their gender identity. It's an emotional debate over privacy, personal safety and prejudice. ("Transgender" refers to someone whose self-identity differs from his or her physical gender sex at birth.) Houston was the site of a showdown last fall. A dispute over school district policy is heating up in Fort Worth, Texas. North Carolina is a current battleground over a state law. Legislators in Tennessee, Kansas, South Carolina and Minnesota push similar versions. The topic could be on ballots in Washington State and elsewhere this fall.

Opponents say that expanding anti-bias protections to bathrooms and locker rooms would make it easier for molesters to enter those sites and harm women or girls. "Non-transgender individuals, some with criminal pasts, have used similar ordinances elsewhere in the country to gain legal access to changing facilities and bathrooms of minors of the opposite sex," claims state Sen. Phil Berger of North Carolina, the Republican leader of his legislative chamber. Rights advocates say that's false and a malicious diversion from issues of fairness and respect. No significant safety problems are linked to laws in 18 states and many cities that already let anyone use bathrooms based on the gender they consider themselves to be, backers say. "This is a non-issue," veteran Sheriff Leon Lott of Richland County, S.C., wrote to lawmakers in his state capital. A recent CNN polls shows that 75 percent of Americans favor laws that guarantee equal protection for transgender people in jobs, housing and facilities.

The U.S. Justice Department jumped in last week, suing to overturn North Carolina's 2016 law restricting transgender bathroom access. Similar measures elsewhere in the country also could be challenged as violating federal rules against discrimination in public places, warns Attorney General Loretta Lynch (see video below). "This is about the dignity and respect we accord our fellow citizens,” she says, "and the laws that we, as a people and as a country, have enacted to protect . . . all of us. . . . This country was founded on a promise of equal rights." Four days later, her Justice Department and Education Department sent a letter directing every public school district to let transgender students use bathrooms that match their gender identity. Schools could face lawsuits or lose federal aid for failing to comply.

U.S. attorney general says: "This is about a great deal more than just bathrooms. . . . None of us can stand by when a state enters the business of legislating identity and insists that a person pretend to be something they are not, or invents a problem that doesn't exist as a pretext for discrimination and harassment." – Loretta Lynch

N.C. governor says: "The Obama administration is bypassing Congress by attempting to rewrite the law and set restroom policies for public and private employers across the country, not just North Carolina." – Pat McCrory

Editorial says: "Despite what supporters of these laws might claim, the measures do nothing to make restrooms safer. They will only further stigmatize and endanger people who already face systemic discrimination." – The New York Times