The U.S. Supreme Court has voted 6-3 that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibiting sex discrimination in the workplace protects the LGBTQIA+ community.
The decision was written by Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch and was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, as well as the court’s four liberal justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Elena Kagen and Stephen Breyer.
“Congress adopted broad language making it illegal for an employer to rely on an employe’’s sex when deciding to fire that employee,” Gorsuch wrote. “We do not hesitate to recognize today a necessary consequence of that legislative choice: An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law.”
The ruling is a historical win and solidifies that members of the community will be protected from discrimination within the education, healthcare, housing and financial credit institutions.
Furthermore, it could put a halt on the Trump administration’s recent rule limiting healthcare access to the transgender community.
The ruling came in three cases involving people fired from their jobs due to their sexual orientation and identity. It included former child welfare services coordinator Gerald Bostock from Georgia, former New York skydiving instructor Donald Zarda who passed in 2014, and former funeral home worker Aimee Stephens who passed in March.