The Iowa Legislature passed a bill (Senate File 418) removing “gender identity” as a protected characteristic under the Iowa Civil Rights Act. The Act prohibits discrimination in employment, education, housing, credit, and...more
3/10/2025
/ Anti-Discrimination Policies ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Employment Policies ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Gender Identity ,
LGBTQ ,
State Labor Laws ,
Title VII
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Virginia denied Liberty University’s motion to dismiss a federal lawsuit brought by a former employee who alleges that Liberty violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act...more
2/28/2025
/ Civil Rights Act ,
Discrimination ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Gender Identity ,
LGBTQ ,
Motion to Dismiss ,
Religious Accommodation ,
Religious Discrimination ,
Title VII ,
Transgender
On Jan. 29, 2025, President Donald Trump signed the “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling” executive order (EO) and the “Expanding Educational Freedom and Opportunity for Families” EO, directing federal agencies to...more
2/7/2025
/ Charter Schools ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Department of Education ,
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Funding ,
Gender Identity ,
Private Schools ,
Public Schools ,
Secretary of Education ,
Trump Administration
On his first day in office, President Donald Trump acted swiftly to ensure federal agencies recognize only two sexes, male and female, and to reject the concept of “gender ideology.” Among the slew of his Day 1 executive...more
The Biden Administration’s April 2024 changes to Title IX regulations were struck down in a court ruling that applies nationwide. State of Tennessee v. Cardona, No. 2: 24-072-DCR (E.D. Ky. Jan. 9, 2025). The Kentucky federal...more
1/13/2025
/ Biden Administration ,
Bostock v Clayton County Georgia ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Compliance ,
Constitutional Challenges ,
Department of Education ,
Educational Institutions ,
Final Rules ,
First Amendment ,
Gender Identity ,
School Policies ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Sexual Harassment ,
Title IX ,
Transgender ,
Trump Administration
Employers must proceed carefully when responding to complaints around pronoun use where federal and state mandates appear to conflict. For instance, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) guidance states that...more
Two cases show that courts consider alleged harassment or discrimination based on transgender or cisgender status to be colorable under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Vacating summary judgment for the employer, a federal...more
Same-sex harassment in the workplace under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act is not strictly limited to the three scenarios in the U.S. Supreme Court’s seminal 1998 opinion in Oncale v. Sundowner Offshore Services, a...more
The Biden administration’s Executive Order 13988, “Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation,” expands prohibited forms of sex discrimination under Title IX of the Education...more
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has announced that it is seeking public input on its updated Compliance Manual on Religious Discrimination.
The compliance manual has not been revised since July...more
The U.S. Supreme Court has held that LGTBQ+ employees are protected from workplace discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The Court issued its decision in three consolidated cases: Bostock v....more
6/16/2020
/ Altitude Express Inc v Zarda ,
Bostock v Clayton County Georgia ,
Civil Rights Act ,
EEOC v RG & GR Harris Funeral Homes ,
Employment Litigation ,
Gender Identity ,
LGBTQ ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Sexual Orientation Discrimination ,
Title VII ,
Transgender
The U.S. Supreme Court is set to hear oral argument on October 8, 2019, in three high-stakes cases that will decide whether LGTBQ+ employees are protected from workplace discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act...more
10/8/2019
/ Anti-Discrimination Policies ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Gender Identity ,
LGBTQ ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Sexual Orientation ,
Sexual Orientation Discrimination ,
Sexual Stereotyping ,
Title VII ,
Transgender
The U.S. Supreme Court term that ended in June 2019 included decisions on many topics important to workplace law, including class actions, arbitration, and administrative exhaustion and Title VII claims.
...more
7/10/2019
/ Age Discrimination ,
Arbitration ,
Auer Deference ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Class Arbitration ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Federal Arbitration Act ,
Fort Bend County Texas v Davis ,
Kisor v Wilkie ,
Lamps Plus Inc v Varela ,
Mount Lemmon Fire District v Guido ,
Parker Drilling Management Services Ltd v Newton ,
SCOTUS ,
Title VII ,
Wage and Hour
Whether LGTBQ employees are protected from employment discrimination by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act will be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court next term.
The Court has agreed to hear three cases to...more
4/23/2019
/ Altitude Express Inc v Zarda ,
Bostock v Clayton County Georgia ,
Civil Rights Act ,
EEOC v RG & GR Harris Funeral Homes ,
Employment Litigation ,
Gender Identity ,
Hiring & Firing ,
LGBTQ ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Sexual Orientation ,
Sexual Orientation Discrimination ,
Title VII ,
Transgender
Gender identity, transgender status, gender non-conformance, and workplace gender transitions are timely topics, both societally and within workplaces. March 31 is International Transgender Day of Visibility, which aims to...more
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission may pursue claims that an employee was discriminated against on the basis of transgender status in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the federal appeals court in...more
In a much-anticipated decision, the federal appeals court in New York has held that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination based on an individual’s sexual orientation. Zarda v. Altitude Express,...more
Observing that it would require “considerable calisthenics” to remove “sex” from “sexual orientation,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, in Chicago, has ruled that “discrimination on the basis of sexual...more
The Trump Administration has announced that the Department of Education (DOE) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) rescinded the Obama Administration’s May 2016 Dear Colleague Letter directing that schools “treat a student’s...more
2/24/2017
/ Attorney General ,
Barack Obama ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Colleges ,
Department of Education ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Executive Orders ,
Gender Identity ,
Public Schools ,
Rescission ,
Revocation ,
SCOTUS ,
Secretary of Education ,
Title IX ,
Transgender ,
Trump Administration ,
Universities
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has stated definitively that it interprets, and will enforce accordingly, the Civil Right Act’s Title VII’s prohibition on sex discrimination as encompassing employment...more
The anti-discrimination protections under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act do not encompass workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, in Chicago, has...more