Chai Feldblum, the first openly lesbian commissioner on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ( EEOC ), has admitted that, since she doesn't have biological children, there are certain laws that have become her "kids."
Among those are the Americans with Disabilities Act ( ADA ) and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act ( ENDA ), both of which she had a hand in authoring.
President Obama nominated Feldblum in 2009, and he named her as a recess-appointment in April 2010. The Senate confirmed her appointment in December of that year. Feldblum was confirmed for a second term in December 2013; the term expires in July 2018.
The EEOC is the most important federal agency for LGBT people facing discrimination in employment, she said.
"The EEOC is responsible for enforcing federal law prohibiting discrimination on a number of characteristics, including sex," she added. "In fact, the way the law is set up, everyone who wants to bring an employment discrimination claim in court has to come through our doors first. … Everyone has to come to us, and when they do come to us, sometimes we can resolve the claims before they ever have to go to court."
LGBTs really weren't able to meaningfully access the EEOC's resources until about the past five years, according to Feldblum. The commission has recently argued that gender identity and sexual orientation are categories protected under the larger umbrella of sex-discrimination.
"One of the things I've been able to do at the commission is have the commissioners say, 'We already have the law that can be used,'" she explained. "It's like this older sibling that's been around the whole time having been ignored, Title VII. When that was first passed, gay people and transgender people came forward, and the federal courts then carved out what was essentially a 'gay exception.' As a matter of common sense, we should have been included from Day One. There is nothing but sex to take into account when we are discriminated against as gay or transgender people."
The United States Supreme Court will likely be the final arbiter of whether the EEOC's interpretation can stand. If not, the matter can likely be resolved should the Equality Act be passed. That law, proposed in 2015, would ratify sexual orientation and gender identity as being under the sex-discrimination category of protections. The Equality Act would also offer protections in public accommodations and housing as well as employment.
Feldblum explained that the first draft of what became ENDA was not just about employment, but was, rather, a similarly full-fledged omnibus bill covering other realms as well.
"We had the debacle of losing our gays in the military fight," she continued. "When that fell, we lost so much momentum that the law that was ultimately introduced was employment-only. It was an omnibus bill, then an employment-only bill, then an employment-bill with exceptions added and exceptions that were there all along. Obviously I was committed all the way through. But I'm very happy that ENDA has been superseded by the Equality Act. It's very much a 'Back to the Future' moment for me. Now it's an omnibus bill, as it always should have been, but I couldn't be happier about the fact that some of the actions I've been involved in for the last six years might make huge portions of [the Equality Act] unnecessary."
She characterized the EEOC as "an excellent agency," admitting her bias since she is in the Democratic majority on the five-commissioner panel. But she noted that the atmosphere is an agency that has not been "poisoned by partisanship."
"To be honest, it's something that's been shaped by the personal friendship and respect that my Republican colleague [Commissioner] Victoria Lipnic and I have for each other," Feldblum added. "We actually knew each other before we came to the commission because of work I had done in labor. She was assistant secretary of labor under Bush II for seven years. Neither of us sought the commission; the White House sought us out. We didn't come with a commitment to partisanship. We came with a commitment to governing."
Feldblum said that in order for the LGBT community to make real progress in the workplace, writing and interpreting laws are not enough; there needs to be significant shifts in workplace daily practices as well as the attitudes and beliefs of workers.
"We need a level of absorption of the climate of the law into the sinews and the muscles of the workplace," she further explained. "As for beliefs, you can have the best workplace practices, but if co-workers still think that gay people should not be open in the workplace, or that someone designated as male at birth should stay that way forever, it's going to be difficult to get full inclusion."
She added that while lesbian, gay and bisexual individuals have made great strides in the workplace, "I think we're hopefully moving rapidly on changing people's attitudes about transgender people, but we have to continue working on that."
Feldblum has not only been a vocal activist for LGBT rights, but disability rights as well. She's also been open about a disability she lives with, generalized anxiety disorder.
"It's incredibly important that each of the commissioners has an incredibly passionate commitment to equal employment opportunity for all people protected under employment laws," she says. "In terms of my passion for equality that goes for all the categories we enforce … . However, I think it's important for the commission to reflect the diversity of the American population. People ought to think about race, sex and national origin. But it's also important to remind people that that diversity also includes being LGBT and having a disability."
Feldblum added that the anxiety disorder had not adversely affected her professional life but she found it important to "identify as a member of the disability community just to help reduce the stigma of psychiatric disabilities. In the seat that I hold, there have been other people with disabilities; I just think I bring a varying diversity to that."
A real concern for the LGBT community should be legislatures and courts carving out exceptions accommodating the beliefs of religious people who believe that LGBT individuals are inherently sinful, she said.
"A personal piece that I bring to that question is that I grew up as a very orthodox Jew," she said. "I come from a very long line of orthodox rabbis, so I have a very deep respect for religious people and for their sense that the ground has shifted beneath them. … I feel that I bring a compassion and understanding to that issue. But even though law cannot change what people believe, law can set parameters about how people must behave in the workplace, public spaces, in commerce. I think that's going to be a challenge, and I hope we meet that challenge as LGBT people with dignity and respect."
