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Lambda Legal filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on behalf of Alexandra “Lexa” Baldwin, a transgender woman employed as an IT technician at the University of Nevada, Reno. Due to a categorical exclusion in the Nevada Public Employees’ Benefits Program (PEBP), Lexa was denied coverage for medically necessary facial surgery. Lambda Legal filed a complaint against PEBP and the Nevada System of Higher Education with the EEOC based on the violation of federal and state laws prohibiting sex-based discrimination in employment.
Lambda Legal filed a federal lawsuit challenging the State of North Carolina’s discriminatory policy requiring transgender people to have undergone “sex reassignment surgery” in order for them to obtain an accurate birth certificate reflecting who they are.
Lambda Legal and Americans United for Separation of Church and State, together with the law firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP, filed a federal lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, along with several HHS officials and programs, for enabling and sanctioning discrimination against LGBTQ foster parent applicants by organizations that receive taxpayer funds to care for unaccompanied refugee children.
A lawsuit against the U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) on behalf of a 65-year-old gay man seeking spousal survivor’s benefits based on his 43-year relationship with his husband, who died seven months after Arizona began allowing same-sex couples to marry. The lawsuit filed on behalf of Michael Ely in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona argues that SSA’s imposition of a nine-month marriage requirement for social security survivor’s benefits is unconstitutional where same-sex couples were not able to be married for nine months because of discriminatory marriage laws.
If you married your same-sex spouse, but were unable to be married for at least nine months before your spouse’s death because of discriminatory marriage laws where you lived, you may be a member of the Ely class. Click here for the Ely FAQ: https://www.lambdalegal.org/in-court/legal-docs/20210212_ely_faq
Lambda Legal filed a federal lawsuit challenging Kansas’ refusal to correct the gender marker on birth certificates for transgender individuals. At the time of the filing, Kansas was one of just three states, along with Tennessee and Ohio, that had yet to change this extremely regressive and outdated policy.
The trial court issued a mutual restraining order against Appellant Maria C. without properly applying section 6305 of the California Family Code, which requires a trial court to make detailed factual findings that each party acted as a primary aggressor and not primarily in self-defense in order to issue mutual domestic violence restraining orders (“DVRO”).
Lambda Legal filed a lawsuit against Oswego County and the Oswego County Department of Social Services (DSS) on behalf of Sean Simonson, a retired transgender county employee.
Bostock v. Clayton County, GA / Zarda v. Altitude Express / RG & GR Harris Funeral Homes Inc v. EEOC
On June 15, 2020, the Supreme Court issued a landmark decision approving the analysis Lambda Legal has been advancing for fifteen years that discrimination based on gender identity or sexual orientation is sex discrimination, and violates the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This federal law, which often is referred to as “Title VII,” prohibits employers from discriminating against employees on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin and religion.
Lambda Legal filed an amicus brief in a case before the U.S. Supreme Court concerning whether the state of Arkansas can disciminate against same-sex couples when listing both spouses as parents on a birth certificate.
Lambda Legal and local counsel Dianne Ellis filed an appeal in the Mississippi Supreme Court on behalf of Christina Strickland, a non-biological lesbian mother denied legal parentage to children she and her now ex-wife planned for and raised together.
Lambda Legal filed a federal lawsuit challenging the State of Idaho’s refusal to allow transgender people to correct the gender on their birth certificates.