A Texas real estate agent who is selling homes for LGBT people who no longer want to live in the GOP-controlled state compared his efforts to those who worked on the Underground Railroad on Tuesday, according to Oklahoma News 4.
Bob McCranie founded “Flee Texas,” which has since become “Flee Red States,” to help LGBT people list their homes in Texas and other red states and connect them with realtors in other locations, according to News 4. McCranie’s clients have moved across the U.S. and to Portugal, Mexico and Ireland, he told the outlet. (RELATED: The Trans Lobby Is Campaigning To Make It Illegal To Talk A Child Out Of A Sex Change)
“We’re calling it kind of the ‘rainbow Underground Railroad,’” McCranie said, according to News 4. “We’re trying to get people out quietly and get them to someplace where they feel safer.”
The Underground Railroad was an organized effort in the mid-19th century to help enslaved people escape and relocate, often at great personal risk and in violation of federal law.
These laws encourage the “financial and emotional destruction” of LGBTQ+ people, says Bob McCranie, a Texas real estate agent who runs FleeRedStates, an initiative he decided to launch in 2021 after observing intimidation of LGBTQ+ Texans #fleeredstates https://t.co/mQ8QotpvAp
— Bob McCranie (@BobMccranie) June 6, 2023
One woman whose son is transgender moved to New Zealand from Texas, fearing that a move within the U.S. wouldn’t be enough to protect them from shifting national views on transgenderism, according to News 4.
“I don’t feel like Texas is my home anymore,” Paul Lewis, who is selling his home in the Dallas suburbs through McCranie and moving to Michigan, told News 4. “Part of me hates the fact that I’m leaving Texas, the home I’ve always known. But part of me is also excited by the fact that I get to start a new chapter.”
Lewis says he is moving in response to both gun violence and state legislation he perceives as anti-LGBT, according to News 4.
Texas banned child sex change procedures, including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgeries, in May.
“As LGBTQIA+ citizens in Red States many of us feel at risk,” McCranie’s website reads. “Current laws are highly discriminatory against trans youth and their families. Our marriages, our families, and even our safety are at risk. If you feel the need to leave the jurisdiction of a Red State, let us help you sell your property here and connect you with an LGBTQIA+ or ally agent in a better location of your choice. We are licensed in Texas and we have affiliates in all 50 states and several counties.”
McCranie warned LGBT Americans that they should urgently consider moving in light of anti-LGBT laws and climate change, he said “the writing is on the wall” and claimed that at some point it would be too late for them to escape, in a recent interview with the Guardian.
“I think the urgency is about a four or a five right now and my concern is when it gets to nine, it will be too late. People won’t be able to get out,” he said.
McCranie told the Daily Caller News Foundation that “I want to apologize and acknowledge the harm for the use of the underground railroad in discussing the LGBTQ migration from red states. In no way was I trying to equate the slavery based oppression that African American experience today with the opportunity the LGBTQ white people have to escape to a different state or country. I’ve learned a lot from this, and I hope it serves as a learning opportunity for others.
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