Trump administration urged to maintain protections for transgender people News
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Trump administration urged to maintain protections for transgender people

The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) called Sunday for the Trump administration to reverse plans to rollback protections for transgender people, in light of a New York Times report on a draft proposal.

According to the report, the Trump administration intends to redefine “sex” to exclude transgender individuals from non-discrimination protections. The report stated that the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) “is planning to release regulations narrowly defining ‘sex’ in an anti-transgender way that guts enforcement of civil rights protections for LGBTQ people.”

HRC said that the administration’s plans are in direct conflict with a growing trend in federal court decisions affirming that sexual orientation and gender identity are covered under our nation’s civil rights laws, and calls for the administration to cease their proposed regulation.

“This is the latest effort in a consistent, multi-pronged campaign by the Trump-Pence White House over the past two years to undermine the rights and welfare of LGBTQ people.”

HRC President Chad Griffin said that the Administration intends to “erase” LGBTQ people from federal civil rights protections and rid of enforcement of non-discrimination laws.

“This is a direct attack on the fundamental equality of LGBTQ people and, if this administration refuses to reverse course, Congress must immediately take action by advancing the Equality Act to ensure that LGBTQ people are explicitly protected by our nation’s civil rights laws.”

The proposed regulation could have severe consequences for same-sex couples and their families. Among those, same-sex couples and their families could be turned away from emergency shelters, a transgender person could have their insurance deny them coverage for transition related care, a gay man could be harassed about being gay at a job skills training, and a transgender woman could be turned away from a hospital for minor injuries.

HRC believes that the Equality Act would finally add clear and comprehensive protections for LGBTQ people. “Discrimination is a real and persistent problem for far too many LGBTQ Americans.”

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