Skip to main content
Donate

Obama Signs Executive Orders Protecting LGBT Employees

By Monica Luhar
July 21, 2014
Support Provided By
President Obama
President Obama signed an Executive Order Monday that would prohibit federal contractors from discriminating LGBT employees based on gender identity or sexual orientation. The order will not include any exemption for religious employers. | Photo: Barack Obama/Flickr/Creative Commons License

President Obama signed two Executive Orders today that will protect employees of the federal government and its contractors and subcontractors from being discriminated against based on their sexual orientation and gender identity.

The orders are amendments to previous orders from two administrations of the 1960s.

Executive Order 11246, issued by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965, prohibits discrimination by federal contractors on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, and natural origin. Obama's order added " sexual orientation" and "gender identity" to the list and applies to "24,000 companies designated as federal contractors whose 28 million workers make up a fifth of the country's workforce," according to Jonathan Capehart of the Washington Post.

This isn't the first time Johnson's order has been amended. In 2002, President George W. Bush added a protection that would permit religiously affiliated entities to favor members of their own faith when making hiring decisions.

"[Today's] order doesn't change that," Ilona Turner, legal director at the Transgender Law Center, told KCET. "Many of us believe that President Obama should in fact repeal that element of the existing executive order because it is pretty outrageous, frankly, to use taxpayer money to discriminate against anyone."

Obama's other action today amends President Richard Nixon's 1969 order, which prohibits the federal government itself from discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, or age. "Sexual orientation" was added to the list of protected classes in 1998 by President Bill Clinton and "gender identity" was added today.

18 states, including California, and the District of Columbia currently have laws that protect LGBT employees at private businesses from being fired on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity, but no federal law protects them from being fired, according to the White House.

"This is a very important day for LGBT Americans," added Turner. "The president has sent a strong message to employers that discriminating because of who someone is or who they love, is not acceptable."

Support Provided By
Read More
Gray industrial towers and stacks rise up from behind the pitched roofs of warehouse buildings against a gray-blue sky, with a row of yellow-gold barrels with black lids lined up in the foreground to the right of a portable toilet.

California Isn't on Track To Meet Its Climate Change Mandates. It's Not Even Close.

According to the annual California Green Innovation Index released by Next 10 last week, California is off track from meeting its climate goals for the year 2030, as well as reaching carbon neutrality by 2045.
By Alejandro Lazo, CalMatters
A row of cows stands in individual cages along a line of light-colored enclosures, placed along a dirt path under a blue sky dotted with white puffy clouds.

A Battle Is Underway Over California’s Lucrative Dairy Biogas Market

California is considering changes to a program that has incentivized dairy biogas, to transform methane emissions into a source of natural gas. Neighbors are pushing for an end to the subsidies because of its impact on air quality and possible water pollution.
By Emma Foehringer Merchant, Inside Climate News
A Black woman with long, black brains wears a black Chicago Bulls windbreaker jacket with red and white stripes as she stands at the top of a short staircase in a housing complex and rests her left hand on the metal railing. She smiles slightly while looking directly at the camera.

Los Angeles County Is Testing AI's Ability To Prevent Homelessness

In order to prevent people from becoming homeless before it happens, Los Angeles County officials are using artificial intelligence (AI) technology to predict who in the county is most likely to lose their housing. They would then step in to help those people with their rent, utility bills, car payments and more so they don't become unhoused.
By Marisa Kendall, CalMatters