Equality Act Under Attack

Despite passage of Equality Act on February 25, 2021 prohibiting discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity in employment, housing, public accommodations, education, federally funded programs, and credit, the protective measures are being countered by the most aggressive anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in recent history.

BY DANIELLE OLIVANI

As the new Biden administration took hold and began to reinstate laws and protections reaffirming the LGBTQ+ community and undoing the damage of the prior administration, it seemed like we all took a collective and audible sigh of relief. Our collective sigh of relief was palpable. The ushering in of President Biden and his cabinet, the most supportive cabinet of the LGBTQ+ community thus far in America's history, gave us hope that we could finally successfully pass the Equality Act.

Things were improving. Rep. David Cicilline (D- RI) and the state legislature introduced the Equality Act on February 18, 2021, and it passed after much cajoling and heated debate on both sides of the House Judiciary on February 25, 2021. The proposed bill amended the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (including titles II, III, IV, VI, VII, and IX) to prohibit discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity in employment, housing, public accommodations, education, federally funded programs, and credit. Therefore, it is up to the Senate to enact the Equality Act, ensuring that every LGBTQ+ person in the country's constitutional rights is preserved and defended federally.

Why, with all of this promise and optimism, is 2021 set to introduce the most egregious and aggressive anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in recent history, with 15 bills becoming law and more than 250 anti-LGBTQ+ legislation introduced in U.S. legislatures? Does a disconnect exist between the voters' feelings about the LGBTQ+ community and our elected officials' discriminatory and biased anti-LGBTQ+ legislation? Many nefarious tactics employed by those who wanted to legislate away LGBTQ+ rights here in Florida and across the country; mass misinformation campaigns and scrupulous claims and outright lies regarding transgender health and weaponizing and warping Christian beliefs to fit their hateful narrative, to name just a few.

Michael Slaymaker, MHRAs, and the Founder of the Orlando Anti-Discrimination Ordinance Committee, which has passed 18 different ordinances and policy changes to protect LGBTQ+ citizens Orange County and Orlando, Florida, states, "I saw the need for the Equality Act decades ago. After the SCOTUS affirmed Bostock v. Clayton County and Harris Funeral Homes v. Aimee Stevens, anti-discrimination toward LGBT[Q+] people in the workplace should be law, but SCOTUS does not make law. Congress makes law. With 50 percent of the states and all the major metropolitan areas having Human Rights Ordinances that include LGBT[Q+] people, it only makes sense that the U.S. Congress gets caught up with the majority of the nation and the SCOTUS. It is time, Shelby. It is time." There is an apparent disconnect; these statistics of the voting public's LGBTQ+ acceptance and inclusion are not reelected by our local, state, or federal lawmakers.

Slaymaker then brought up the enormous discrepancies in rights and protections codified from state to state. Because of the lack of uniform, unified federalprotections that could be enforced across the U.S., LGBTQ+ people could unknowingly be stripped of their constitutional rights and have no recourse or legal standing to fight back when and if those rights are challenged or infringed. There are approximately 20 states with no transgender rights protections and 25 percent with limited protections but exclude protections resulting from housing discrimination. The rights of an LGBTQ+ person in states like Massachusetts, Maine, and Vermont are very inclusive and fully constitutionally protected, versus states like Arkansas, South Dakota, Louisiana, and Tennessee, where rights and protections are afforded to the hetero-normative population pale in comparison or totally nonexistent.

This rise in intolerance and outright bigotry results from the prior administration's pandering to their most extreme constituents; the LGBTQ+ community has fallen prey to the evils of identity politics. This strong division between the right and left has caused a faction of the Evangelical voting block to draw even harsher lines in the sand regarding homosexuality, being transgender, and the entire queer community. They have politicized and weaponized to galvanize their base under the guise of "morality," "wanting to protect children," and "safety and abuse prevention." For example, issues like transgender youth playing sports and children using the restroom affirm their sexual identity. Proposing and enacting anti-transgender legislation is a tactic for the far-right to prohibit transgender youth and their families from their inalienable rights.

Nevertheless, conversely, a recent poll done by the Human Rights Campaign and Hart Research Group revealed that, concerning transgender youth participation in sports, the public's strong inclination is on the side of fairness and equality for transgender student-athletes. 73 percent of voters agree that "sports are important in young people's lives. Young transgender people should have access to opportunities to participate in a safe and comfortable environment."

The LGBTQ+ community is villainized and deemed morally reprehensible and irredeemable by a vocal and politically powerful lobby of the conservative Christian right-wing faction of the Republican Party. The relentless pursuit of legislating morality and arbitrators of all socially and societally acceptable, interpreted, and understood solely from their moral, social, and political perspective, is costing LGBTQ+ people their lives. The transgender community, predominantly black and brown women, statistically are exponentially far more likely to become a victim of exploitation, violence, and death; this is due to many things such as lack of family support, housing insecurity, insufficient or nonexistent job opportunities, or prospects, and lack of adequate medical care, all of which the Equality Act, passed on the federal level would address.

At times it can seem all doom and gloom, yet on the positive side, the LGBTQ+ community has seen significant gains in the employment sector since the Supreme Court's landmark ruling on June 15, 2020. With their landmark 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court reversed this truth for the LGBTQ+ community. Justice Gorsuch ruled that the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on sex in the workplace, should also protect the LGBTQ+ community.

The LGBTQ+ community, in anticipation of the Senate, must decide to do what is legally and morally right and pass the Equality Act, must be proactive and campaign aggressively for their local communities to pass resolutions and ordinances that ensure civil and legal protections. Until the LGBTQ+ is fully protected against discrimination and bias federally, drafting, proposing, and introducing anti- LGBTQ+ legislation at the local level, is the ultimate way for the LGBTQ+ community to exercise and enforce their agency within the community and ensure our voices are heard.

DANIELLE OLIVANI is a proud mom, community organizer/activist, and CEO of Lake County Pride Org. Corp; an LGBTQIA+ nonprofit which seeks to improve the lives of Lake County youth through advocacy, education, and acts of service to the community. She is a longtime resident of Lake County and currently lives in Mount Dora, Fla. She graduated from the Rollins College Paralegal Studies program and obtained her certification in 2017.