Norton Says Final DOL Rule Brings First Federal Protection Against Bias to LGBT Americans

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), a former chair of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), today praised the Department of Labor (DOL) for its final rule, announced earlier this week, that implements President Obama's Executive Order (EO) prohibiting federal contractors from discriminating against employees based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The EO is the first federal anti-discrimination protection for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Americans in the private sector. Currently, there is no federal law that prohibits companies from discriminating against their employees based on sexual orientation or gender identity, although 18 states and the District of Columbia have such laws.

"The DOL rule ensured appropriate enforcement of the President's EO to help eliminate discrimination against LGBT employees of federal contractors and subcontractors, and brought up the need for Congress to use its authority to do the same for all other U.S. employers by passing the Employment Non-Discrimination Act," Norton said.

Norton said President Obama did what President Franklin Delano Roosevelt did in 1941 with Executive Order 8802, which barred discrimination in the federal government and defense industries based on race, color, creed and national origin, well before Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act barred discrimination in the entire country.

The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) would ban workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Norton has been pressing for House passage of ENDA since she was first elected to Congress. The bill has special meaning for Norton because it amends Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, barring job discrimination, which she enforced as chair of the EEOC. The bill currently has 206 cosponsors in the House of Representatives.

Norton has been a longtime leader for LGBT rights. After the District of Columbia passed its marriage equality law, Norton was successful in defeating several attempts in the House and Senate to repeal the law.