The U.S. Supreme Court is poised to cap a term like no other with potentially blockbuster decisions covering birth control, religious rights and President Donald Trump’s efforts to keep his financial records private.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) has published a handbook on sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression to “affirm God’s love for people of all sexual orientations and gender identities,” the Christian Post reports. The publication is part of an ELCA effort to welcome and include members of the LGBTQIA+ community to all aspects of church life.
Poland’s right-wing president, Andrzej Duda, was seeking a second five-year term in an election amid controversy. Sunday’s poll was seen as a test whether voters share his plans of implementing a conservative agenda. His policies include judicial reforms that the European Union claims undermine democracy.
Justice Neil Gorsuch’s majority opinion in Bostock v. Clayton County, a Supreme Court decision extending employment protections to gay and transgender people, kicks off a new religious liberty battle.
In a 6-3 ruling issued on Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court said an employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender violates Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The US Department of Health published a new rule Friday asserting that protection against “sex discrimination” in health care applies only to people who are biologically male or female. Focussed on Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act, the final rule rolls back an Obama-era regulation which had added “gender identity” as grounds under which a person could suffer health care discrimination. Religious and conservative groups have welcomed the rule as protecting freedom of conscience and allowing federally funded medical practitioners and insurance companies to refuse the provision or coverage of transgender treatments. However, human rights groups are concerned the rule will leave trans-Americans without access to standard needed health care that is unrelated to sex change.
The U.S. Supreme Court will effectively decide whether Christian and conservative employers can be forced to hire transgender people and gays. Its case centers around a late funeral director who, in 2013, lost her job after telling her boss she would transition from male to female.
Hungary’s Parliament has approved legislation that bans transgender people from changing the gender they were assigned at birth on official documents.
The presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Joe Biden has stated insurance companies should treat genital reconstruction surgery as a medical necessity for transgender people, the Washington Examiner reports.
Rights group Amnesty International has condemned the Hungarian parliament’s rejection of an international treaty to combat violence against women amid a coronavirus pandemic. “This decision is extremely dangerous,” said David Vig, Amnesty’s Hungary director. “It comes at a time when reported domestic violence incidents in Hungary have doubled since the start of the [new coronavirus] COVID-19 lockdown” to halt the virus outbreak.
A UK cabinet minister has said the government is planning legislation that would prohibit minors from receiving gender reassignment surgery, the Daily Telegraph reported. Equalities Minister Liz Truss was addressing a parliamentary committee last week when she stated it was important to protect minors from making such irreversible decisions.
A new law signed by Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam on Friday has the effect of prohibiting any place or business that is open to the public from denying transgender biological males access to ladies’ bathrooms, locker rooms or dressing rooms.
Planned Parenthood of California is supporting a bill that would prevent health insurance companies from giving parents information about “sensitive” medical procedures received by young adult or minor children listed on their same policy. “Sensitive services” would include abortions and certain transgender treatments and sex-change operations, among various others. The California Family Council (CFC) has advised concerned residents to contact the office of Senator Hannah-Beth Jackson (D), who is sponsoring the bill.
Evangelist Franklin Graham has been banned from delivering sermons by all seven venues on his upcoming tour of the United Kingdom.
Following South Dakota, one lawmaker in Florida is proposing legislation that would outlaw sex-change procedures for children.
The state of Illinois is changing the parental designations on its birth certificates to accommodate the wishes of transgender people.
A major gay rights organization is pushing for 20 percent of all television characters to be LGBT by the year 2025.
In the world of high school sports right now, the issue of transgender athletes is becoming a challenge, especially for female athletes forced to compete against boys who identify as girls.
The governor of Texas is intervening in a custody case amid controversy over a decision of a Dallas jury allowing a mother to proceed with gender transitioning against the wishes of his father.
Supreme Court justices Tuesday questioned if expanding discrimination protection to transgender workers would soon mean grappling with men in the women’s room or men playing women’s sports.