June 15, 2020 | Category: Discrimination, Employment, News

“An employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the United States Supreme Court.

“Sex plays a necessary and undisguisable role in the decision, exactly what Title VII forbids.”

An important quote from a landmark decision today from the nation’s highest court that protects gay, lesbian, and transgender people from discrimination in employment. The court decided by a 6-3 vote that a key provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, known as Title VII, that bars job discrimination because of sex, among other reasons, also applies to LGBT workers.

The outcome is expected to have a big impact for the estimated 8.1 million LGBT workers across the country because many states do not currently protect them from workplace discrimination.  Until now it was unclear whether Title VII protections applied to LGBT workers who claimed unfair treatment and discrimination in the workplace. 

Although a big ruling for employers across the nation, the impact on Nevada employers is not as profound.  As we previously noted, Nevada is one of the few states that already provides protections for Nevada workers from sexual orientation discrimination and gender identity or expression discrimination.

Interested in learning more about these employment protections and how they apply to your workplace? NAE provides on-site training for supervisors and employees on workplace harassment or send your team to our popular Supervisory Skills: The Fundamentals series, to learn about Title VII and other state and federal employment laws.