June 15, 2020: It’s time to celebrate!
Today the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 6-3 decision that Tile VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars discrimination in employment on the basis of sex, also prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. This is huge.
The three cases involved are R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v. EEOC and Aimee Stephens; Altitude Express Inc. v. Zarda; and Bostock v. Clayton County. In each of the three, a long-time employee was fired because their employer learned that they are either transgender or gay. The Court said, in each of the cases, the employers were clearly firing an employee “for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex. Sex plays a necessary and undisguisable role in the decision, exactly what Title VII forbids.” We want to emphasize that this statement is a recognition of what we’ve always known: Discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation is a form of sex discrimination.
PWN will continue to fight to ensure no one faces discrimination or is denied services simply because of who they are. It’s scary to think that LGBTQ people, and especially Black and brown LGBTQ people, can be and have been denied the medical care they need when they need it. This is unacceptable in the best of times, and even more so in the midst of three epidemics — HIV, COVID-19 and racist state violence — that disproportionately impact Black communities. Just three days ago, the Trump administration’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) finalized a rule that would erase anti-discrimination protections for transgender people in health care settings based on a very narrow reading of the word “sex” in Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act. Today’s Supreme Court decision will make that rule much harder to uphold. Still, we understand that the threats and attacks are real and continuous; this is a crucial victory, and we can’t stop now.
There are important gender and racial justice implications in this ruling. Black and non-Black LGBTQ people of color report being more than twice as likely as white LGBTQ people to experience employment discrimination. Even after today’s decision, Black LGBTQ people will still face disproportionate discrimination across their lives. The legal rights of all LGBTQ people will not be secure until we end the systemic ways in which racism is used 1) to oppress Black people and other people of color— at work, in the streets, in the voting booth, and elsewhere—and 2) to maintain and expand white supremacist social, political and economic power.
Until our laws remedy systemic racism and violence, and our culture catches up to those laws, the movement for equity for all LGBTQ people is far from done.
Today’s decision is an important step forward. It is a bright moment in difficult times and a powerful reminder of how much work is left to do. PWN intends to continue moving in solidarity with those doing great work nationwide. With that being said, this is an opportunity to celebrate and we’re going to take it!
