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Transgender Rights Project

Through the Transgender Rights Project (TRP), GLAD puts our litigation, legislative, and educational assets to work in a focused way to establish clear legal protections for the transgender community.

Transgender Rights Project

Transgender Family Law

Sign up to receive information when GLAD’s upcoming book, Transgender Family Law: A Guide to Effective Advocacy becomes available.

Video

Everyone Matters: Dignity and Safety for Transgender People

News

November 16, 2011 Transgender Protections Passed in Massachusetts

July 12, 2011 GLAD Lawsuit Produces New Denny’s Bathroom Policy for Transgender Patrons

June 20, 2011 Following the passage of non-discrimination legislation in Connecticut, Jennifer Levi talks about the importance of transgender non-discrimination laws in Jurist

February 17, 2011 - Governor Patrick Signs Historic Executive Order Protecting MA Transgender State Employees GLAD, MTPC and MassEquality initiated a conversation with Governor Patrick about issuing an executive order to provide employment protections to transgender state employees and employees of state vendors. We’re excited to announce that Gov. Patrick signed this executive order on 2/17/11. As the largest employer in the state this sends a strong signal to the legislature and we hope to see a statewide bill passed in 2011.

About the Transgender Rights Project

Transgender people face the most basic and blatant discrimination every day - from being denied access to employment, housing, or healthcare, to being physically attacked because of the way they look or dress.

Through the Transgender Rights Project (TRP), GLAD puts our litigation, legislative, and educational assets to work in a focused way to establish clear legal protections for the transgender community. Information about current and past cases can be found below.

The TRP also works closely with state-based transgender advocacy organizations. Community collaboration is at the heart of so much of GLAD’s work. A key to our success is that each organization makes unique contributions.

These collaborations include our partnership with the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition. GLAD worked together with MTPC and other members of the MA Transgender Rights Coalition to successfully pass a bill in 2011 that adds gender identity and expression to the state’s nondiscrimination and hate crimes laws.

In addition, after several years of advocacy by GLAD and MTPC with the Registry of Motor Vehicles and other state agencies, a new policy for changing gender markers on identification documents was achieved in 2010. GLAD continues to monitor its implementation and provides information to the transgender community about the new policy.

In Connecticut, GLAD was a key partner in the coalition, ctEquality, that successfully worked to pass a statewide bill that adds gender identity and expression to Connecticut nondiscrimination laws in 2011.

With TransGender New Hampshire, GLAD participated in public education and legal work to support a bill which includes transgender people in the anti-discrimination statute in New Hampshire in 2009. Unfortunately this bill was defeated last legislative session. Undeterred, we are working to be sure the community is ready for future re-introduction of the legislation in 2011. To do so, GLAD has helped establish a new coalition, the New Hampshire Coalition for Transgender Equality.

Jennifer Levi, Esq.

Jennifer L. Levi is one of our nation’s leading experts on transgender legal issues. She has been with GLAD since 1998, and has served as lead counsel in a number of precedent setting cases establishing basic rights for transgender people. These cases include: Doe v. Yunits, in which Jennifer represented a transgender student denied the right to attend school because of the clothing she wore; Rosa v. Park West Bank, which established key protections for transgender people under federal law; Beger v. DMA, which resulted in a reversal of Division of Medical Assistance’s refusal to cover breast surgery for a transgender woman, among many others. Jennifer was also co-counsel in the case of Goodridge v. Dep’t Public Health which established the right of same-sex couples to marry in Massachusetts.

Jennifer is a Professor of Law at Western New England University. She serves on the Legal Committee of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, and is a founding member of both the Transgender Law & Policy Institute and the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition.

Jennifer is a graduate of Wellesley College (1985) and the University of Chicago Law School (1992). She has also taught law at the Chicago-Kent Law School and is a former law clerk for Judge Michael Boudin at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.

Video: Jennifer Levi talks about GLAD's Transgender Rights Project
Video: Jennifer Levi testifies in Massachusetts in support of transgender nondiscrimination protections
Jennifer Levi interviewed in Tapestry Magazine in 2005

Related Cases

Doe v. Clenchy

Pending • Transgender Rights Project •

Case Summary
GLAD is representing a transgender teen girl whose Orono,… Read More

Adams v. Bureau of Prisons

Settled • Transgender Rights Project • September 30, 2011

Update: September 30, 2011

A settlement was announced September 30, 2011 in… Read More

Freeman v. Denny’s

Settled • Transgender Rights Project • March 23, 2011

GLAD’s Transgender Rights Project and Realty Resources Hospitality, which operates six Denny’s… Read More

In re A.M.B.

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • June 24, 2010

GLAD filed an amicus brief with the Maine high court in support… Read More

O’Donnabhain v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • February 2, 2010

Victory! On February 2, 2010, the U.S. Tax Court issued an important… Read More

Blanchette v. Saint Anselm College

Settled • Transgender Rights Project • December 31, 2006

In June 2005, GLAD filed a lawsuit in U. S. District Court… Read More

Barreto-Neto v. Town of Hardwick Police Department

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • December 31, 2004

GLAD worked with a police officer in the Town of Hardwick, Vermont,… Read More

Jette v. Honey Farms

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • December 31, 2001

One of two landmark rulings issued in October 2001, in which the… Read More

Millett v. Lutco

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • October 1, 2001

One of two landmark rulings issued in October 2001, in which the… Read More

Rosa v. Park West Bank

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • December 31, 2000

In a precedent-setting decision with major implications for the business community, the… Read More

Beger v. Division of Medical Assistance

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • December 31, 2000

In this case, a Superior Court in Suffolk County ordered the state… Read More

In re John/Jane Doe

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • December 1, 2000

In November 2000, the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities (CHRO)… Read More

Doe v. Yunits

Victory • Transgender Rights Project • January 1, 2000

GLAD obtained a landmark ruling, in the first reported decision ever in… Read More