NOW Applauds Groundbreaking Effort to Pass Gender-Inclusive Legislation

May 26, 2005

The National Organization for Women proudly salutes the introduction of the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2005. Introduced in the House on Thursday, May 26, this is the first legislation to explicitly include transgender individuals in civil rights law. The bill is designed to help protect against bias crimes based on gender identity, sexual orientation, gender and disability and also adds gender and gender identity to the Hate Crimes Statistics Act.

"NOW was an early supporter of transgender inclusion in the Hate Crimes bill," said NOW Action Vice President Olga Vives. "Since transgender people are a major target of hate-motivated violence it was imperative that gender identity be included in this important policy initiative."

The chief sponsors of the House bill are Representatives John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, Barney Frank, D-Mass., Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., Christopher Shays, R-Conn., and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis. NOW applauds this bipartisan effort as a further step toward eradicating injustice in our society.

NOW's National Conference passed in 2002 a resolution stating that "the National Organization for Women has a policy on combating oppression of transgender people". The body of delegates asserted that the organization will "advocate and work for the inclusion of 'sex, transgender people, and gender identity and/or expression' as protected categories in legislation currently in Congress, specifically the Local Law Enforcement Act, and in future legislation protecting civil rights."

"This legislation will have a huge legal and educational impact as we work together to stop the attacks in our society against the LGBT community," Vives said. "We will be working with our champions in the Senate and expect them to introduce a similar bill with equally broad inclusion for gender identity. With the passage of this legislation, we can take down these and other barriers of discrimination and achieve our goal of full inclusion—for all people—in our society."

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