A federal judge in Texas threw out advice from a government body that would have protected people from being harassed at work because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.
Thursday, Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas said that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission went beyond what the law allowed it to do when it told employers that intentionally using the wrong pronouns for an employee, blocking their access to bathrooms that match their gender identity, and not letting them wear dress code-compliant clothing that matches their gender identity may all be forms of workplace harassment.
Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act protects workers and job applicants from being discriminated against at work because of their race, color, gender, sex, or national origin.
The EEOC enforces laws against discrimination in the workplace. In April of last year, under President Joe Biden, the agency changed its advice on harassment in the workplace for the first time in 25 years. It came after the Supreme Court said in 2020 that gay, lesbian, and transgender people are not discriminated against in the workplace.
In August, Texas and the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank behind Project 2025, questioned the guidance. The agency says that the guidance is only meant to help employers make sure they are following anti-discrimination rules and is not legally binding. Kacsmaryk didn’t agree and wrote that the guidance sets “mandatory standards” that will have legal effects for employers who don’t follow them.
The decision is the latest blow to protections for transgender workers at work. It comes after President Trump’s executive order on January 20 saying that the government would only accept two “immutable” sexes: male and female.
As a Trump nominee in 2017, Kacsmaryk threw out all of the EEOC guidance that defines “sex” to include “sexual orientation” and “gender identity,” as well as the whole part that talked about the topic.
“Title VII does not require courts or employers to keep the biological differences between men and women hidden,” he wrote in the decision.
“The Biden EEOC tried to force businesses—and the American people—to deny basic biological truth,” said Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts in an email. President Roberts praised the ruling. No, not so fast, thanks to the great state of Texas and the work of my Heritage colleagues today.
He went on to say, “This decision is more than a legal win.” It has to do with culture. It tells you no, you don’t have to give up common sense for leftist ideas. “Men don’t have to act like women.”
In a press release on Friday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton also talked about the win against “Biden’s “Pronoun Police” Rule.” He said, “The federal government has no right to force Texans to play along with delusions or ignore biological reality in our workplaces.”
In an email, the National Women’s Law Center criticized the decision. In November, the group filed an amicus brief in support of the harassment guidelines.
“The district court’s decision is an outrage and clearly goes against what the Supreme Court has said before,” said NWLC’s senior director of litigation for education and workplace justice, Liz Theran. “The EEOC’s Harassment Guidance reminds both employers and employees of a simple thing that shouldn’t cost anyone anything: don’t put others down at work because of who they are or who they love.” Even though this decision doesn’t change the law, it will make it harder for LGBTQIA+ workers to stand up for their rights and have a harassment-free workplace.
In his decision, Kacsmaryk gave a narrower reading of Bostock v. Clayton County, the important Supreme Court case that protected LGBTQ+ workers from discrimination. He said that the Court “firmly refused to expand the definition of ‘sex’ beyond the biological binary” and only said that employers could not fire workers for being gay or transgender.