Major Companies Urge SCOTUS To Take Up LGBT Workplace Discrimination Case

Major American corporations have signed on to an amicus brief filed in the U.S. Supreme Court urging the high court to rule that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 bars discrimination based on sexual orientation in the workplace.

The Trump administration has taken the opposite opinion.

From the AP:

The 76 businesses and organizations - including American Airlines, Apple, eBay, Facebook, Google, Starbucks and Microsoft - filed a brief Wednesday encouraging the high court to take up the issue. They want the court to take a case out of Georgia in which a gay woman who worked as a hospital security officer says she was harassed and punished for dressing in a male uniform and wearing her hair short. Jameka Evans, who worked at Georgia Regional Hospital at Savannah from 2012 to 2013, ultimately left her job and sued.

The question in her case is whether a federal law barring workplace discrimination "because of...sex" covers discrimination against someone because of their sexual orientation. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under President Barack Obama took the view that it does. But President Donald Trump's administration has argued that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 bars discrimination based on gender but doesn't cover sexual orientation.

The businesses' court filing says they and their employees would benefit if the court agreed to take the case and rule that Title VII covers sexual orientation discrimination.