For homeless trans people there are many laws here in Connecticut that protect us from discrimination and with Trump appointing a new Supreme Court justice it will tip the court on the side of the LGBTQ haters.
The National Law Review
September 24, 2020
Nearly one-third of transgender individuals experience homelessness at some point in their life, and 70% of those who have stayed in a homeless shelter have reported some form of mistreatment, including harassment and refusal of service, due to their gender identity. Transgender individuals are significantly more likely to end up homeless than the general population because they often face rejection by their family members and discrimination in employment and housing. The levels of discrimination and income inequality are even higher for transgender women of color, and the COVID-19 pandemic has further exacerbated the rates of unemployment, poverty, and homelessness among the transgender population.
On September 22, 2020, pro bono attorneys filed a public comment letter on behalf of The National LGBT Bar Association and Foundation urging the withdrawal of a Proposed Rule issued by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) that would severely harm homeless transgender, intersex, and gender nonconforming individuals by allowing federally funded homeless shelters to discriminate against them on the basis of their gender identity. The Proposed Rule would eliminate key non-discrimination protections previously afforded to transgender shelter-seekers under HUD’s 2016 Equal Access Rule and would permit single-sex shelters to turn away transgender, intersex, and gender nonconforming individuals if the shelter operator determines that the individual is not of the same “biological sex” as the other shelter residents.
The Proposed Rule is premised on the medically and legally indefensible presumption that an individual’s sex can be determined solely on the basis of their external physical characteristics. In reality, an individual’s “biological sex” is complex, multi-faceted, and primarily determined not by external physical characteristics, but by an individual’s gender identity—which is sometimes referred to as one’s “brain sex.” The Proposed Rule’s reduction of “biological sex” to physical sex stereotypes such as “height, the presence (but not the absence) of facial hair, the presence of an Adam’s apple, and other physical characteristics,” would not only result in discrimination on the basis of gender identity and transgender status, but would also enable single-sex shelters to arbitrarily provide or deny shelter based solely on a shelter worker’s assessment of whether an individual appears sufficiently “male” or “female” enough to enter. Denying shelter to transgender, intersex, or gender nonconforming individuals on the basis of such physical sex stereotypes constitutes a type of gender discrimination that numerous courts have found unlawful.
We celebrated the Supreme Court ruling this spring were the court determined that “sex” is more than what is between your legs. But that court ruling is now being ignored by the Trump administration.
The Washington Blade
By Chris Johnson
September 16, 2020
Faced with having to enforce the law to prohibit anti-transgender discrimination in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision for LGBTQ rights this summer, the Trump administration has sought to minimize the breadth of the ruling in ways that could still lead to transgender people being denied access to public spaces and activities.
Although the Supreme Court decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, which found anti-transgender discrimination is a form of sex discrimination, thus illegal in the workplace under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, would in theory apply to all statutes and laws against sex discrimination — the Trump administration is promulgating rules allowing anti-transgender discrimination to persist with respect to sex-segregated facilities, such as homeless shelters and school sports.
It boils down to this legal theory: Denying transgender people access consistently to sex-segregated spaces with their gender identity is not tantamount to discrimination, so long as they’re so afforded entry according to their gender assigned at birth. Forcing transgender people into these spaces inconsistent with their gender identity, however, would be something few would be willing to accept, and may make them more vulnerable to harassment and violence.
[…]
“The administration is arguing that, while bans on sex discrimination encompass gender identity discrimination, they do not, in the administration’s view, require that transgender individuals be treated as the sex with which they identify,” Davidson said.
So we are going to see this back in the Supreme Court and with Justice Ginsberg not longer there to defend us what do we have to look forward to when the case reaches the court… Hint: it is not good.
She once questioned the court’s landmark ruling on marriage equality.
VOX
By Katelyn Burns
September 26, 2020
President Donald Trump nominated federal Judge Amy Coney Barrett to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court Saturday, a choice LGBTQ rights groups are concerned could lead to a reduction in the rights of LGBTQ Americans.
The Supreme Court has historically been important for the advancement of LGBTQ rights, with its rulings giving gay and lesbian people marriage equality and recently, protecting queer and trans people from employment discrimination under federal law.
And there are a number of important cases soon to come before the court; for example, Fulton v. City of Philadelphia is set to be heard the day after Election Day. That case, in which a religious adoption agency is seeking the right to turn away LGBTQ couples, will determine whether taxpayer-funded organizations are allowed to discriminate against LGBTQ people.
[…]
As Vox’s Ian Millhiser has explained, while Barrett has not served long as a federal judge, and thus does not have as long a judicial record as many Supreme Court nominees. However, as a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, “she frequently weighed in on many of the cultural fights that animate religious conservatism.”
One of these is the issue of LGBTQ rights, which has been a long and evolving debate for conservatives, many of whom have fought against policies such as trans people using the bathrooms that align with their gender identity and transition care for trans teens.
Past presidents appointed Supreme Court justices who had a life long who had a long history of rulings from the bench, while judge Barrett has only been on the bench for two years and now she has been nominated to the highest court in the land and she is only 48 years old,one of the youngest justices who have been appointed to the court for life..
Of concern to activists like David is that Bostock isn’t the only trans rights case that will hit the Supreme Court under the next justice’s tenure. The court will be called upon to rule on several big legal battles brewing for years, over issues such as transgender student bathroom rights, or trans women participating in women’s sports.
This is going to be horrible in the coming years.
You know that the court case here in Connecticut on trans athletes is going to the Supreme Court, there are no ifs ands or buts about it. And the way it stands now we will lose the case with a Trump court.
I had dinner with a couple at Max on the Pier in Wellfleet last night at sunset sitting out on the beach. They have picnic table where you can eat out on the beach.
It was a great end for the weekend with friends
I was reading an article about Trump’s nominee and she said…
