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Federal court rules against Jeff Sessions’ anti-LGBTQ agenda and says that transgender workers are protected under Title VII
U.S. appeals court rules that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects workers from discrimination on the basis of gender identity
NEW YORK – GLAAD, the world’s largest LGBTQ media advocacy organization, released the following statement in response of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that Title VII, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, includes protections for transgender workers in the case EEOC v. RG & GR Harris Funeral Homes. This is a major victory against the anti-transgender agenda of Jeff Sessions’ Department of Justice who rescinded a policy that argued that transgender workers were protected under Title VII and the Alliance Defending Freedom, a designated anti-LGBTQ hate group with close ties to the Department of Justice who defended the employer in this case.
“Once again the courts have affirmed what we already know, that transgender people, like all LGBTQ people and indeed all Americans, are entitled to equal protection from discrimination in their places of employment,” said Sarah Kate Ellis, President and CEO of GLAAD. “This is yet another signal that governance by bias and bullying, which has become hallmarks of the Trump Administration as well as the anti-LGBTQ activists and hate groups with whom they are aligned, will not stand in this nation.”
This is the second blow to Jeff Sessions’ anti-LGBTQ interpretation of Title VII in the last two weeks following the February 26thruling by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that stated, against a Department of Justice amicus brief, that sexual orientation is also protected under Title VII.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION: Jeff Sessions’ Ties to Alliance Defending Freedom
- Consulted with the ADF on the October 2017 Department of Justice guidance to government agencies about how to interpret so-called “religious freedom.
- Spoke at a closed-door ADF summit on so-called “religious freedom” as the active US Attorney General.
- The ADF has posted Sessions’ “We Will Defend Religious Freedom Resolutely” speech as the centerpiece of its monthly magazine, and even listed him on the masthead as a contributor to the publication.
- Prior to Sessions’ confirmation hearing, ADF founder Alan Sears wrote an Op-Ed praising Sessions, in large part because of his resistance to LGBTQ rights.
- Aligned himself with current ADF CEO Michael Farris in opposing the United Nations’ “Convention on the Rights of the Child” in 2010.
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