EEOC Will Allow Christian Employers to Misgender Trans Employees
The EEOC has agreed to limit how it enforces certain gender-identity discrimination claims against members of a Christian employers group.
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) will limit its enforcement of certain gender-identity discrimination claims against members of the Christian Employers Alliance under a new settlement.
The Christian Employers Alliance (CEA), a group representing Christian employers, sued the EEOC in January 2025, arguing that the agency “improperly applied Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to force employers to affirm and accommodate” transgender employees, reports HR Brew.
CEA claims the agency did this under the Biden administration, including through 2024 guidance addressing pronoun use and access to facilities consistent with employees’ gender identity. The group also objected to the EEOC’s position on employer-sponsored insurance coverage for gender-affirming care, arguing that these requirements could conflict with some members’ religious beliefs.
The Biden administration treated gender-identity discrimination as a form of sex discrimination prohibited under Title VII. In a landmark 2020 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Title VII protects workers from being fired because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.
Conservatives have argued that the Bostock decision should be interpreted narrowly — prohibiting employers from making hiring, firing, and advancement decisions based on a person’s LGBTQ identity, but not requiring measures such as using transgender employees’ pronouns or allowing them to use restrooms that align with their gender identity.
The EEOC reached a partial settlement with CEA, approved last month by a federal judge. Under the agreement, the agency will not pursue charges against qualifying current or future CEA members over specified workplace decisions involving pronoun use, sex-specific dress codes, or access to single-sex facilities.
The provision applying to future CEA members is unusual, protecting qualifying members from EEOC enforcement over the specified gender-identity discrimination claims — even under a future Democratic administration.
“I am not aware of any settlement that just creates in perpetuity a freedom from investigation,” Karla Gilbride, a former EEOC general counsel under President Joe Biden, told The Intercept. “I’ve never seen an organization get a settlement that allows protection to future members in this way.”
While the settlement protects qualifying current and future CEA members from EEOC enforcement over the specified claims, it does not prevent employees from bringing their own discrimination lawsuits.
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