Family and Partnership Recognition
Just as non-transgender people have the ability to adopt children, to take time off from work to take care of family members, and to get married, transgender people should also be entitled to those legal protections. If implemented, the proposals listed here will ensure that all families are entitled to receive the legal benefits they deserve.
- Foster Care. Congress should prohibit foster care agencies receiving federal funding from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity and expression.
- DOMA Repeal. Congress should repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).
Federal Form Categories. The Office of Management and Budget should require that any federal government forms requiring information about an individual’s parents use the label “Parent” rather than “Mother” and/or “Father.”
- Repeal FMLA Regulation. The Department of Labor should repeal recently revised regulations for the Family and Medical Leave Act to ensure that medical privacy laws are not violated and transgender status is not intentionally or inadvertently revealed to employers.
- Transgender Marriage Recognition. In each agency and program for which marital status is relevant, the federal government should recognize all valid marriages (that were valid at the time of marriage) where one or both persons is transgender, regardless of whether the marriage occurred before or after the transgender person(s) transitioned.