Updated: April 22, 2019 / 9:42 AM
On Monday, the Supreme Court decided on whether or not the U.S. law prohibited workplace discrimination based on sex, and protects both gay and transgender workers, as the conservative-majority court waded into a dispute over a divisive and social issue.
The high-profile legal fight is debating whether gay and transgender people are covered and protected by the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars employers from discriminating against their employees based on sex as well as race, color, national origin and religion. The Trump administration has argued that Title VII does not cover sexual orientation or gender identity.
The court, whose made up of 5-4 conservative majority, includes two Trump appointees that will take on the two cases concerning gay people who have claimed they got fired because of their sexual orientation, one of which involved a New York skydiving instructor named Donald Zarda and another involving a former child welfare services coordinator from Georgia named Gerald Bostock.
The court will also hear a Detroit funeral home’s bid to reverse a ruling that it violated due to them firing a transgender funeral director who’s name is Aimee Stephens. They fired her after she revealed her plans to transition from male to female.
The justices will hear each of the arguments and issue a ruling in their next term, which will start in October.