LGBTQ+ Rights

Q67: Do you support explicit federal protection from discrimination for LGBTQ+ persons and their families?

Biden: Yes. I will provide moral leadership to champion equality for all LGBTQ Americans and fight to ensure our laws and institutions protect and enforce their rights. I have named the Equality Act as a top legislative priority. In the majority of states across the country, state law does not explicitly protect LGBTQ individuals from discrimination. It’s wrong, and I will make the case for and pass the Equality Act so that LGBTQ individuals receive consistent protection from discrimination, including in employment, housing, credit, education, public spaces and services, federally funded programs, and jury service. I will also direct my Cabinet to ensure immediate and full enforcement of the Equality Act across all federal departments and agencies.

Bloomberg: Yes. Mike Bloomberg has a comprehensive policy to ensure LGBTQ+ equality, including a commitment to equal treatment of all LGBTQ+ Americans in the workplace and their communities, addressing disparities in health care and treatment, protecting LGBTQ+ youth and families, and ending violence against LGBTQ+ people.

Mike will pass and sign the Equality Act into law, ensuring that LGBTQ+ Americans have consistent non-discrimination protection in a variety of areas, including employment, housing and access to credit, just to name a few.

Buttigeig: Yes. We will start with an intentional dismantling of the institutionalized discrimination confronting the LGBTQ+ community. I will press for and sign the Equality Act into law as soon as it hits my desk, making anti-discrimination the law of the land. I will use more comprehensive strategies to end hate-based violence against LGBTQ+ people, especially Black transgender women; increase access to housing for LGBTQ+ Americans; and strengthen protections for LGBTQ+ immigrants and refugees.

De La Fuente: Yes. America should have the most progressive policies based on equality and fairness.

Klobuchar: Yes. Senator Klobuchar has committed to passing the Equality Act in year one of her Presidency to take on discrimination against LGBTQ Americans. In addition, Senator Klobuchar will restore protections for the LGBTQ community when it comes to civil rights, education, and health care. She will create an Office of LGBTQ Antidiscrimination within the White House Domestic Policy Council to coordinate antidiscrimination efforts across federal agencies, reject efforts to give federal protections to those discriminating against LGBTQ people, recognize third gender markers on the federal level in line with the decision of federal courts, direct the Food and Drug Administration to end all non- medically-based restrictions on blood donations, support training for health care workers to provide appropriate and equitable care to LGBTQ patients, strengthen protections for medically-necessary transition-related care, prioritize mental health and investing in suicide prevention programs, collect data to track and address LGBTQ disparities in care, improve support and protections for older LGBTQ Americans, and expand efforts to reduce LGBTQ homelessness.

Sanders: Yes. The United States has made remarkable progress on equality in a relatively short amount of time. But there is still much work to be done. In many states, it is still legal to fire someone for being LGBTQ+. Incredibly, it is still legal to deny someone housing or service in the military for being transgender. That is unacceptable and must change. We must end discrimination in all forms. Bernie will sign into law the Equality Act, the Every Child Deserves a Family Act and other bills to prohibit all forms of discrimination against LGBTQ+ people.

Steyer: Yes. We remain in the midst of a long fight for equality. To this day, far too many are still subjected to discrimination because of who they are or who they love. From the Stonewall Riots to the AIDS crisis, through to Marriage Equality, grassroots LGBTQ activists have fought for recognition as equal citizens under the law. These efforts have led to remarkable strides toward equality, including the Supreme Court’s decision in 2015 to legalize same-sex marriage nationwide. We must celebrate this progress, but as we do so, we must acknowledge that the work is not finished. It is time for a president who will embrace and represent the vibrancy and diversity of the whole LGBTQ community — including LGBTQ youth, queer people of color, transgendered folks, and intersex individuals — and defend equal justice under the law for every American. Hand-in-hand with those who have been fighting for equality for decades, I will work hard to ensure that LGBTQ individuals have equal rights and cannot be discriminated against in the workplace, at the doctor’s office, in school, in search of support services and public accommodations, in tax policy, in the criminal justice system, and in building loving families.

This approach will ensure that each policy is approached through a justice-oriented lens that takes into consideration race, socioeconomic status, and other factors that influence available opportunities. We must look holistically at our policies and their implementation because protecting people from hate, from discrimination, and from denial of their basic human rights is not “special treatment”; it is America finally living up to our constitutional responsibilities and our responsibilities as fellow human beings.

Warren: Yes. I believe every person should be treated with dignity and respect and feel safe to be who they are. First, I will fight to pass the Equality Act to explicitly guarantee that no LGBTQ+ person in America is discriminated against for who they are or who they love. And I will eliminate the filibuster so that we have a path to getting critical legislation like the Equality Act passed. But we can’t just wait for Congress to act. In my first 100 days as president, I will use every legal tool we have to make sure that LGBTQ+ people can live free from discrimination. We will restore and strengthen critical Obama-era non-discrimination protections that the Trump administration gutted. We will also take steps to affirmatively expand LGBTQ+ non-discrimination protections everywhere, from education to health care, workplaces, housing, to the criminal justice system, through regulation and executive action. We’ll cover all medically necessary care for LGBTQ+ patients under Medicare for All, including transition related care, and allowing providers discretion to deem gender-affirming procedures as medically necessary based on an individualized assessment.I’ll publicly manufacture PrEP, ending the unconscionable price-gouging on Truvada. My administration will also make LGBTQ+ non-discrimination a condition of federal grants, expand affirmative civil rights testing, institute a nationwide ban on conversion therapy, make it easier to change identification documents to reflect a person’s gender identity, and make sure that federal family programs like paid family leave cover chosen family members. My administration will fight to end the murders of transgender women of color, and we’ll use every legal tool we have to prohibit the intersecting forms of discrimination that transgender women of color face everywhere it occurs.