[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1209 Introduced in House (IH)]
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117th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. RES. 1209
Recognizing that it is the duty of the Federal Government to develop
and implement a Transgender Bill of Rights to protect and codify the
rights of transgender and nonbinary people under the law and ensure
their access to medical care, shelter, safety, and economic security.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
June 28, 2022
Ms. Jayapal (for herself, Mr. Cicilline, Ms. Newman, Mr. Takano, Mr.
Torres of New York, Ms. Adams, Ms. Barragan, Ms. Bass, Mr. Blumenauer,
Ms. Blunt Rochester, Ms. Bonamici, Mr. Bowman, Mr. Brown of Maryland,
Ms. Brown of Ohio, Ms. Brownley, Ms. Bush, Mr. Cardenas, Mr. Carson,
Mr. Casten, Ms. Castor of Florida, Ms. Chu, Ms. Clark of Massachusetts,
Ms. Clarke of New York, Mr. Connolly, Mr. Danny K. Davis of Illinois,
Ms. Dean, Mr. DeFazio, Mr. DeSaulnier, Mr. Doggett, Ms. Escobar, Ms.
Eshoo, Mr. Evans, Mr. Garamendi, Mr. Garcia of Illinois, Mr. Gomez, Mr.
Green of Texas, Mr. Grijalva, Mrs. Hayes, Mr. Higgins of New York, Ms.
Jackson Lee, Ms. Jacobs of California, Mr. Johnson of Georgia, Mr.
Jones, Mr. Keating, Mr. Khanna, Ms. Kuster, Mr. Langevin, Mr. Larson of
Connecticut, Mrs. Lawrence, Ms. Lee of California, Ms. Leger Fernandez,
Mr. Levin of Michigan, Mr. Lowenthal, Mr. Lynch, Mrs. Carolyn B.
Maloney of New York, Ms. McCollum, Mr. McGovern, Ms. Meng, Ms. Moore of
Wisconsin, Mr. Nadler, Mrs. Napolitano, Ms. Norton, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez,
Ms. Omar, Mr. Panetta, Mr. Payne, Ms. Pingree, Ms. Porter, Ms.
Pressley, Mr. Quigley, Mr. Raskin, Ms. Sanchez, Ms. Schakowsky, Mr.
Smith of Washington, Mr. Soto, Ms. Speier, Ms. Stevens, Ms. Titus, Ms.
Tlaib, Mr. Tonko, Mrs. Trahan, Ms. Velazquez, Mrs. Watson Coleman, Mr.
Welch, Ms. Williams of Georgia, and Ms. Wilson of Florida) submitted
the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the
Judiciary, and in addition to the Committees on Education and Labor,
Energy and Commerce, Financial Services, and Oversight and Reform, for
a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for
consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the
committee concerned
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Recognizing that it is the duty of the Federal Government to develop
and implement a Transgender Bill of Rights to protect and codify the
rights of transgender and nonbinary people under the law and ensure
their access to medical care, shelter, safety, and economic security.
Whereas an estimated 1,400,000 transgender adults live in the United States;
Whereas title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 requires equal treatment under
the law regardless of sex;
Whereas the Supreme Court affirmed in Bostock v. Clayton County that Federal
protection against discrimination on the basis of sex includes
protection from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and
gender identity;
Whereas despite these protections, transgender people still experience
discrimination in medical care, employment, housing, education, lending,
and other basic necessities;
Whereas the right of transgender and nonbinary people to seek lifesaving,
gender-affirming care and counseling is under threat across the Nation;
Whereas transgender and nonbinary people face significant barriers to legal
recognition of their truest selves on government documentation and
identification;
Whereas transgender and nonbinary people experience disproportionately high
rates of poverty, homelessness, violence, and suicide; and
Whereas transgender and nonbinary people detained in jails, prisons, and
immigration detention centers are especially vulnerable to violence and
abuse and are often deprived of gender-affirming supplies and care: Now,
therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives
that--
(1) it is the duty of the Federal Government to protect the
rights of transgender and nonbinary people as outlined in this
Transgender Bill of Rights by--
(A) ensuring transgender and nonbinary people have
equal access to services and public accommodations that
align with their gender identity by--
(i) amending the Civil Rights Act of 1964
to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex,
including gender identity and sex
characteristics in public accommodations and
federally funded programs and activities;
(ii) expanding the definition of public
accommodation to address the full range of
places and services that members of the general
public utilize;
(iii) explicitly clarifying that it is
illegal to discriminate on the basis of sex,
including gender identity or sex
characteristics in public accommodations and
services on religious grounds; and
(iv) amending Federal education laws to
ensure that they protect students from
discrimination based on sex, including gender
identity and sex characteristics, and guarantee
students' right to--
(I) participate in sports on teams
that best align with their gender
identity; and
(II) use school facilities that
best align with their gender identity;
(B) ensuring transgender and nonbinary people can
care for themselves and their families by fully
codifying the Bostock decision by--
(i) eliminating hiring and employment
discrimination and workforce exclusion by
amending title VII of the Civil Rights Act of
1964 to explicitly clarify that employers may
not discriminate on the basis of actual or
perceived gender identity or sex
characteristics;
(ii) amending the Fair Housing Act to
explicitly clarify that it prohibits all forms
of sex discrimination, including on the basis
of gender identity or sex characteristics;
(iii) codifying the Housing and Urban
Development Department's Equal Access Rule
requiring equal access to HUD housing programs
without regard to a person's actual or
perceived gender identity; and
(iv) amending the Equal Credit Opportunity
Act to explicitly clarify that it prohibits all
forms of sex discrimination, including on the
basis of gender identity or sex
characteristics;
(C) recognizing the right to bodily autonomy and
ethical health care for transgender and nonbinary
people by--
(i) strengthening, implementing, and
enforcing prohibitions on discrimination in the
provision of health care on the basis of sex,
including on the basis of actual or perceived
gender identity or sex characteristics;
(ii) eliminating unnecessary governmental
restrictions on the provision of, and access
to, gender-affirming medical care and
counseling for transgender and nonbinary
adults, adolescents, and children;
(iii) ensuring that health care providers
following standards of care for transgender and
nonbinary people are not targeted for criminal
or civil penalties or professional discipline;
(iv) expanding access to providers with
competency serving transgender and nonbinary
patients, including by recruiting and training
more health care providers to provide
appropriate care;
(v) codifying Roe v. Wade, guaranteeing the
right to abortion, and codifying the right to
reproductive health care such as birth control
and fertility treatments for everyone,
including transgender and nonbinary people; and
(vi) banning the use of forced surgery that
violates medical ethics and human rights on
intersex children and infants;
(D) providing accessible avenues for legal
recognition of transgender and nonbinary identities
by--
(i) eliminating gender identification
requirements on government documents that are
unnecessary to determine the identity of the
holder or otherwise irrelevant to the purpose
of the document;
(ii) eliminating burdensome barriers to
updating sex and names on passports, Social
Security cards, and other forms of government
identification and records, permitting, where
possible, changes on self-attestation alone;
(iii) requiring that an ``X'' marker be
available on government identification and
records that still require gender; and
(iv) eliminating the Federal requirement to
list a gender on State identification;
(E) strengthening the safety of transgender and
nonbinary people by--
(i) investing in community services to
prevent intimate partner, family, and community
violence against transgender and nonbinary
people and expand services for transgender and
nonbinary survivors;
(ii) investing in mental health services
and suicide prevention programs designed for
transgender and nonbinary people;
(iii) banning fraudulent and harmful so-
called ``conversion therapy'' practices;
(iv) ensuring robust regulations and
procedures that affirm that claims for
immigration relief or asylum based on
persecution related to gender, sexual
orientation, gender identity, and sex
characteristics are protected grounds in the
context of asylum adjudications; and
(v) exploring policies and practices that
would improve the safety of transgender and
nonbinary individuals incarcerated in jails,
prisons, and immigration detention facilities
and ensure that those populations have access
to appropriate services and commissary items;
and
(F) actively enforcing the civil rights of
transgender and nonbinary people by all government
agencies including by--
(i) requiring the Attorney General to
designate a liaison within the Civil Rights
Division of the Department of Justice dedicated
to advising on and overseeing enforcement of
the civil rights of transgender and nonbinary
people; and
(ii) appropriating the funds necessary to
fully staff and support the enforcement of
these rights across agencies;
(2) the actions listed above are only the first steps
toward transgender equality;
(3) to carry out the goals above, Federal agencies must
collect gender identity and sex characteristics information on
a voluntary, confidential basis solely for equity and public
health purposes in key Federal surveys;
(4) the Federal Government must make an ongoing commitment
to the rights of transgender and nonbinary people; and
(5) policies concerning transgender rights must be led and
informed by transgender communities, in particular Black and
indigenous women who face heightened risk of violence, poverty,
discrimination, and other harm due to their intersecting
identities.
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