A college baseball team had to cancel an upcoming series because the other school is Sun Heraldin a state with an anti-LGBT "religious freedom" law.

The coach of the men's baseball team at Stony Brook on Long Island nixed the three-game matchup with the University of Southern Mississippi after Mississippi passed HB 1523, which exempts anyone who defines marriage as between one man and one woman, sex as something that should only happen within a marriage, and gender as biological and fixed at birth from anti-discrimination laws.

The same day the "Protecting Freedom of Conscience From Government Discrimination" Act was signed, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo issued an executive order banning "non-essential" travel to Mississippi. (Stony Brook is part of the State University of New York system.) After an appeal was rejected, HB 1523 went into effect on October 10. So when the Golden Eagles' 2018 game schedule was released today, the series with Stony Brook was replaced by a tournament at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas.

Lambda Legal’s Susan Sommer says HB 1523 "creates a toxic environment of fear and prejudice." She called laws like it "a pack of wolves in sheep’s clothing, dressing up discrimination and calling it religious freedom.”

But Governor Phil Bryant insists HB 1523 just ensures Mississippi can "peacefully live and work without fear of being punished for their sincerely held religious beliefs."

Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood disagrees: In 2016, he claimed the law "tarnished" the state's reputation.

"[It's] distracting from the more pressing issues of decaying roads and bridges, underfunding of public education, the plight of the mentally ill, and the need to solve our state’s financial mess,” he added.

A similar travel ban went was enacted last year in California, but state college teams were allowed to travel for previously-scheduled trips.