President Donald Trump is using executive orders to attack the LGBTQ community
TAMMYE NASH | Managing Editor
Nash@DallasVoice.com
Legal Defense Fund and Lambda Legal this week filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of National Urban League, the National Fair Housing Alliance, and the AIDS Foundation of Chicago challenging three of Donald Trump’s executive orders attacking diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility and transgender people.
These orders, if enacted, will severely limit the plaintiff organizations’ “ability to provide critical social and health services such as HIV treatment, fair housing, equal employment opportunities, affordable credit, civil rights protections and more,” according to a press release announcing the lawsuit, and would harm “countless people across the United States, including people of color, women, LGBTQ people, people with disabilities and people living with HIV.”
By issuing these executive orders, the lawsuit charges, the Trump administration is violating the plaintiff organizations’ rights to free speech and due process and is “engaging in intentional discrimination” by issuing and enforcing these executive orders.
The three executive orders being in this lawsuit challenged terminate equity-related grants and forbid federally-funded entities from engaging in diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility programs, and from recognizing the existence of transgender people.
But this lawsuit — National Urban League v. Trump, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia — is just one of many that have been filed in the month since Trump took office for his second term and began trying to remake the federal government via executive order.
According to a report by NewsNationNow.com, as of Monday, Feb. 17, at least 74 lawsuits had been filed in federal court challenging the flood of executive orders Trump has issued since being inaugurated into his second term. Also as of Feb. 17, federal judges had halted — at least temporarily — 18 of those executive orders as a result of pending litigation.
While 33 of the lawsuits address activities by the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency, and another 19 are related to Trump’s anti-immigrant efforts, others center on Trump’s ongoing attacks on the LGBTQ community, especially transgender people.
Lambda Legal is involved in at least three of those lawsuits, including the case filed Feb. 19 on behalf of the three nonprofits. And Shelly Skeen, director of Lambda Legal’s South Central Region based in Dallas, said her organization is determined to repeat the success it had with such challenges during Trump’s first term in office.
“We filed 12 or 14 lawsuits the first time Trump was in office, and we won 86 percent of the time,” Skeen said. “We intend to be just as successful this time. Just stay tuned.”
In Shilling v. Trump, Lambda Legal and the Human Rights Campaign Foundation filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the Trump administration’s ban on military service by transgender people. That case was filed Feb. 6 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington and has six transgender plaintiffs who are currently active in the military, one trans man who wants to enlist and the Gender Justice League.
In PFLAG v. Trump, Lambda Legal, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Maryland, joined by pro-bono co-counsel Hogan Lovells and Jenner & Block, filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of PFLAG, GLMA, transgender young adults and families with transgender youth challenging Trump’s executive order attempting to shut down access to necessary medical care for transgender people under 19 nationwide.
That case was filed Feb. 4 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. Nine days later on Feb. 13, the court issued a temporary restraining order enjoining implementation and enforcement of Trump’s order.
GLAD Law — founded in 1978 as Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders — has also filed multiple lawsuits challenging Trump’s anti-LGBTQ orders.
On Feb. 3, GLAD Law and the National Center for Lesbian Rights filed Talbot v. Trump challenging Trump’s ban on transgender military servicemembers.
GLAD Law and NCLR have filed three cases — Moe v. Trump, Doe v. McHenry and Jones v. Trump — challenging sections of an executive order that directs the federal Bureau of Prisons to house transgender women in men’s prisons and to withhold necessary medical care. Plaintiffs in these cases are trans women “who were suddenly removed from their general population housing in women’s prisons, placed in special housing units and faced imminent transfer to men’s facilities,” according to the GLAD Law website. “They were also at risk of having their essential medical care terminated.”
As of Feb. 12, GLAD and NCLR had secured temporary restraining orders in Moe and Doe preventing their clients from being transferred. The third case was filed Feb. 11.
In Tirrell and Turmelle v. Edelblut, GLAD Law and the ACLU of New Hampshire are defending Parker Tirrell and Iris Turmelle, two transgender high schoolers challenging the ban that aims to keep them and other trans girls from playing sports in public schools. The case was originally filed as a challenge to a New Hampshire state law but, on Feb. 12, was expanded to include Trump following his Feb. 5 executive order banning trans girls from sports nationwide, the GLAD website notes.
Other agencies are also involved in filing challenges to Trump’s administration as well. The ACLU and the ACLU of Massachusetts, for example, have filed Orr v. Trump challenging the State Department’s refusal to issue correct passports for transgender people.
Skeen noted that even as challenges to the Trump administration’s executive orders continue, Lambda Legal and other agencies — such as GLAD Law, ACLU, Human Rights Campaign and NCLR — are fighting right-wing efforts to attack and suppress the LGBTQ community at the state and local levels as well.
Lambda Legal, for example, is currently litigating several cases in Texas, including PFLAG v. Office of the Attorney General of Texas, challenging Ken Paxton’s effort to obtain private medical records and other information regarding transgender youth in the state. And in Loe, et al v. Texas et al, Lambda Legal, the ACLU, the ACLU of Texas and the Transgender Law Center, along with the law firms Scott, Douglass & McConnico LLP and Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP, are suing the state to block SB14 which bans medical care for transgender youth.
In PFLAG v. Abbott, Lambda Legal, the ACLU and the ACLU of Texas, and Texas-based law firm Baker Botts LLP, are requestings that the court block state investigations of PFLAG families in Texas who are supporting their transgender children with medically necessary health care. Doe v. Abbott, with the same organizations representing the plaintiffs, is also aimed at stopping CPS investigations of families and medical professionals helping trans youth access gender-affirming care.
Other Lambda Legal cases with Texas ties include Marouf v. Becerra (Formerly Marouf v. Azar) involving adoption rights and Murphy v. Colvin involving Social Security benefits for same-sex spouses.
With both the executive branch and congress in the grips of anti-LGBTQ forces right now, the courts are the community’s best bet for keeping the rights already won, as well as working toward full equality — especially in states like Texas, where the right wing also holds sway in the Legislature.
“If we don’t file these cases, people are going to suffer,” Skeen said of the efforts by Lambda Legal and others. And she urged individuals to know their legal rights and to get help if those rights are threatened.
Even with court injunctions, she warned, there will be agencies — governmental and otherwise — who try to enforce these anti-LGBTQ orders and legislation.
“For example, if you get a subpoena, get a lawyer immediately. Remember that you do not have to turn over confidential documents just because the governor or the attorney general or somebody asked for them.
“If you need information, go to the Lambda Legal website, LambdaLegal.org. We have a lot of resources available there — FAQs, fact sheets,” Skeen urged. “If you need help, reach out to our help desk and let us know what’s going on. We can help you find legal help.
“No matter what, if something happens, don’t wait. Reach out to an attorney, to Lambda Legal or someone, immediately.”
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