Advocacy Groups Release 10 Steps Biden Can Take Right Away To Ensure LGBTQ Protections

The new Biden administration presents many opportunities for rebuilding and expanding our nation’s commitment to equality, including for LGBTQ people and their families.

The work ahead is plentiful and much of it will require collaborative and working in coalitions, legislative action, and a recommitment to values of inclusion, diversity, and nondiscrimination at all levels of the government. LGBTQ people, along with too many others, have been under attack from the federal government for the last four years.

The Movement Advancement Project (MAP), along with Center for American Progress, Equality Federation, GLSEN, National Center for Transgender Equality, and SAGE, released a list of actions the Biden administration can take immediately after taking office in January to support LGBTQ people and their families. The groups also outlined longer-term priorities and legislative opportunities, including passing the Equality Act.

Here are the ten things these organizations are lobbying for President-elect Biden’s administration to achieve right out of the gate.

1. Create a federal plan to address the rampant and increasing violence against transgender people, especially black transgender women.
2. Act quickly to protect LGBTQ people from discrimination.
3. Reverse the ban of transgender people in military service.
4. Immediately release people held by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), including transgender asylum seekers and people living with HIV, from detention facilities.
5. Set public health goals to achieve the end of the U.S. HIV epidemic and elimination of HIV‐related health disparities by 2025.
6. Ensure that the Federal Bureau of Corrections place people in facilities that match their gender identity.
7. Restore the United States’ leadership on human rights and safety internationally for LGBTQ people.
8. Direct the Department of Justice to review and update agency positions on ongoing litigation, such as lower court challenges of the Affordable Care Act, Title IX litigation for transgender students, and others to reflect Bostock and the importance of nondiscrimination protections.
9. Create an LGBTQ equity policy council.
10. Direct federal agencies to protect LGBTQ youth, LGBTQ elders, and transgender people in housing, healthcare, education, and other vital programs.

Founded in 2006, the Movement Advancement Project (MAP) is an independent, nonprofit think tank that provides rigorous research, insight and communications that help speed equality and opportunity for all.

Read the full details of 10 ways the Biden administration can support LGBTQ people during week one in office.