This has been a busy month for nondiscrimination activity, with significant legal and policy developments.
- On June 12, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced that it had finalized a rule that eliminates some of the nondiscrimination protections in health care and coverage. Existing laws and regulations prohibited discrimination in health care and coverage based on race, color, national origin, sex, age, disability and gender identity. The changes finalized by HHS threaten to discourage or prevent people from accessing needed care and may undermine the Administration’s own efforts to address the spread of COVID-19, end the HIV epidemic, respond to the opioid epidemic, and eliminate the inequities in health care.
- The development at HHS happened on the heels of a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) resolution on June 9 reaffirming its commitment to enforce federal laws that protect all employees in the U.S. against employment discrimination and condemning the violence that has claimed the lives of Black persons in America.
- Then, on June 15, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a landmark decision that gay and transgender people are protected from workplace discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This decision affects all employers with 15 or more employees. This historic ruling on LGBTQ nondiscrimination could sideline the recently finalized rule that eliminates some of the nondiscrimination protections in health care and coverage.