An Arkansas town's transgender ordinance, controversially opposed by "19 Kids and Counting" star Michelle Duggar, has been repealed.
Voters in the town of Fayetteville repealed Ordinance 119, an "anti-discrimination city policy" which would have expanded legal protections to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
The measure also would have allowed trans men and women to use the public facilities of their adopted gender, reports Raw Story.
"Voters turned out in record numbers for a special election, according to the election commission," reveals an entry on nwahomepage.com. "The final numbers revealed 7,523 (52 percent) voted for the repeal, while 7,040 (48 percent) against, passing the issue by less than 500 votes. Around 29 percent of Fayetteville's registered voters cast ballots in this special election."
The Ordinance gained considerable traction after Michelle Duggar campaigned against it earlier this summer, reportedly recording robocalls that went out to every phone in Fayetteville.
"I don't believe the citizens of Fayetteville would want males with past child predator convictions that claim they are female to have a legal right to enter private areas that are reserved for women and girls," the "19 Kids and Counting" matriarch warned.
Last month, Jim Wissick of San Jose, California, created a petition on Change.org calling for the Duggars to be taken off the TLC network for "LGBT fear mongering."
"The claim that this ordinance would provide predators with access to women's restrooms in order to assault or leer at girls or women is nothing more than fear-mongering and spreading [ignorance] and hatred,"
"The Learning Channel and Discovery Networks need to [separate] themselves from this bigotry and put an end to the Duggar's show," Wissick asserted.
Wissick's petition on change.org had gathered over 184,000 signatories as of Thursday, having passed the 150,000 milestone in November.
However, counter-petitions created in support of the Christian conservative family and using the hashtag #DefendTheDuggars gained over 209,000 signatures as of Friday.
A petition created by the American Family Association has also garnered more than 164,000 signatures.
Michelle Duggar's husband, Jim Bob, has said that the publicity has only helped the popularity of "19 Kids and Counting" and added that efforts to have the TLC show cancelled "won't work."
"Our show is the No. 1 show on TLC. We love everybody. It's a small group creating this fuss. All it has done is give us more exposure," Jim Bob said. "We've gained 50,000 Facebook fans last week. God is expanding our border through the national media."
"19 Kids and Counting" recently received its highest ratings ever, with a total of 4.41 million viewers for the two-hour special of Jill Duggar and Derick Dillard's wedding,
