Local Reaction to Supreme Court Decision (6-19-20)

Local Reaction to Supreme Court Decision (6-19-20)

Still plenty of reaction from monday's historical ruling coming down from the u.s. supreme court against the trump administration affirming that the lgbtq community is protected by federal law from workplace discrimination... kq2's kilee thomas spoke with a local pastor and lgbtq activist is lauding the decision.

On monday, the supreme court ruled in favor of protecting the lgbtq community against workplace discrimination something that up until four days ago could get you fired here in missouri.

In a 6-3 vote three separate cases of workplace discrimination including fired counselor gerald bostock "one of the persons who was named in the supreme court case who was simplified fired from his job because his boss found out he joined a gay softball league."

"i'm overwhelmed with joy and my heart is filled with gratitude."

The supreme court ruling discrimination based on someone's sexual orientation or gender identity violates federal law... "it is no longer legal in any state, but particularly here in missouri it is no longer legal to fire someone simply because they for example identify as gay."

A landmark decision that caught many by surprise initial response to the supreme court's decision was shock.

I don't think any of us were expecting it given the current makeup of the court, given the number of conservatice judges that have recently been appointed and the fact that a few of them crossed the isle, were not the ones we expected to do that.

It was a total shock."

Title vii of the civil rights act of 1964 prohibits employers from discriminating based on sex court ruling sexual orientation and gender identity fall under that definition.

"even with a conservative supreme court, they saw that this was a no-brainer."five years after same sex marriage was legalized protecting lgbtq people in the areas of housing, employment or public accommodation "when i moved here with my husband seven years ago and we were looking for rental property, we didn't know what we were going to discover once somebody found out that it was two men looking for a place to live and we knew we had no recourse and we would still have no recourse."

Here in st.

Joseph...the city passed a non- discrimination ordinance but local lgbtq activists say the order has no teeth "although we have an ordinance saying you should not discriminate against somebody because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, the fact is you can still do it in st.

Joseph and nothing can be done about it.

Now, we have a system to try and have mediation between people, let's say between as a business and a person who identifies as gay, but that's as far as we can go right now."

Reporting in st.

Joseph, kilee thomas, kq2 news lgbtq activists encourage the public to call up your local elected officials...and ask for a more punishable ordinance for housing and public accomidation discrimination