Can someone explain this news from USA?

[FannyCann]

I mean I don't think there are many fans of Trump around here but this latest seems to be reversing the conflation of gender identity with sex discrimination and sticking with sex.

"When Congress prohibited sex discrimination, it did so according to the plain meaning of the term, and we are making our regulations conform," said Severino in a statement.
"We have concluded in our most recent filing with the court that discrimination on the basis of sex does not cover gender identity," he said during a press briefing.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/05/24/726552816/trump-administration-proposes-rule-to-reverse-protections-for-transgender-patien

https://twitter.com/zaneemma/status/1132138875982307328?s=21

Also McFibber is very cross about this so it must be good right?

The Obama administration issued a letter of guidance saying that it was going to interpret long-standing laws protecting women as a sex to mean gender. So provisions outlined to protect women, like sports funding, sex segregated housing, scholarships, etc., were no longer sex specific. Anyone who identified as a woman could use those provisions, regardless of biology.

The trump administration is now going back to the old system. They are doing the right thing for the wrong reasons.

What we need are provisions that allow women sex segregated activities, programs, and spaces when needed and specific laws against discrimination in employment and education due to the realities of our biology. We also need specific laws against discrimination in employment, education, and housing due to gender expression. The trump administration is taking the step to give women back their spaces, like homeless
Shelters, but they are not creating spaces for gender non-conforming people at the same time.

Ah. Thanks. But still, don't look a gift horse in the mouth right?

Always look a gift horse in the mouth. Particularly a Trump shaped gift. Persecution of a vulnerable group should not be allowed to slip by because it is dressed up as protecting a different vulnerable group.

What is being done is despicable and it's a real shame that the actions of the vocal and violent few has led to such a massive divide because all vulnerable groups should be standing shoulder to shoulder on this one not "taking the win" regardless of the cost.

They are doing the right thing for the wrong reasons.

This exactly. I hate the trump administration and I hate their motivations for this but I also disagreed with some of the basis of the Obama changes.

One of the issues is access to homeless shelters. We support and do a fair amount of volunteer work with a homeless shelter in the US which has a men's side and a women's side. Many of the people who use the shelter are very very vulnerable and many have multiple mental health/addiction issues going on. Serving dinner to the women users of the shelter recently, I was struck by how vulnerable they would be if a man were sharing their space. While no one wants an openly transgender female put into the male side, no one wants men sleeping in the women's side either. There has to be a better way of dealing with this that helps everyone than pretending men are women or vice versa.

*Always look a gift horse in the mouth. Particularly a Trump shaped gift. Persecution of a vulnerable group should not be allowed to slip by because it is dressed up as protecting a different vulnerable group.

What is being done is despicable and it's a real shame that the actions of the vocal and violent few has led to such a massive divide because all vulnerable groups should be standing shoulder to shoulder on this one not "taking the win" regardless of the cost.*

Saying this again and louder. This is my exactly feeling on the subject. I do not support Trump, he does not represent my views, he has made this choice to persecute trans people not to support women, that is not the outcome GC people want. There is no "victory" here unless everyone's right to safety and dignity is protected and balanced.

On July 21, 2014, President Obama issued an executive order (emphasis mine, is this the same as "regulatory capture"?) that amends Executive Orders 11478 and 11246 by adding LGBT anti-discrimination protections. President Obama took this action after Congress failed to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would have prohibited all employers with fifteen or more employees from discriminating based on “sexual orientation” or “gender identity.”

Executive Order 11478 protects federal employees against certain types of discrimination. When President Nixon issued Executive Order 11478 in 1969, it barred discrimination “because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, handicap, or age.” Subsequently, President Clinton amended Executive Order 11478 to include “sexual orientation.” President Obama’s executive order, which is effective immediately, provides further protections for federal employees by prohibiting discrimination based on “gender identity.”

Executive Order 11246, which President Johnson issued in 1965, only governs federal contractors and federally-assisted construction contractors and subcontractors who perform more than $10,000 in Government business in one year. Since 1965, these employers have been prohibited from discriminating against any employee or applicant for employment on the basis of “race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.”
Here's the link: www.beankinney.com/virginia-employment-law-journal/lgbt-in-the-workplace-president-obamas-executive-orders
Trump's action was to rescind this.
It's a mess ova here

WOLF Women's Liberation Front is leading the way in legal challenges in the US concerning sex-based rights. Check out their info in this battle (actually an uphill series of misogynist skirmishes)
Please donate if you can
womensliberationfront.org/title-vii-cert-grant/

So I am confused, was gender discrimination added, or was sex to be understood as meaning gender? Or something else?

Well, the translobby have put all their energy and resources into having access to women's spaces, totally alienating women, apart from a few lib fems, in the process, whereas if they had campaigned for their own spaces, they would have had so many women backing a just cause.

Now the ordinary transgender person on the street is going to suffer and that is wrong, but it is good news that women's sex-based rights are going to be respected again.

The problem is that

but it is good news that women's sex-based rights are going to be respected again.

The problem is that the only right Pence et al seem to believe in is the right to use a single sex toilet.

They actively campaign to reduce maternity, employment and contraception rights, and I doubt that they have much genuine interest in protecting female sport.

Oops - double post!

Thanks all for interesting and informative posts. The person on twitter from my original link seemed delighted about it but my instinct was there was more to it and it's good to have the explanations. Of course coming from Trump I guessed it was not well meant.

The article also mentions abortion discrimination

"Today's proposed rule from HHS's Office for Civil Rights also proposes to reverse language in the Obama-era rule that included termination of pregnancy in the definition of sex discrimination."

I don't get what this means in relation to sex discrimination?

SignMeUp those executive orders are both regarding employment law. How did sport etc. end up being included?

Eh, you can look a gift horse in the mouth when that gift horse also is not reuniting families separated at the borders (and separated them in the first place), has children living in “day camps” and dying, is supportive of the roll back on abortion rights (overturning Roe v Wade) and reproductive freedom, and whose leader abuses and sexually assaults women.

thecompletenonsequitu
As I understand it, including gender identity in civil rights legislation, will then be applied to Title IX, which is an educational amendment (1972) to the 1964 law to extend sex based rights in any federally funded school and widely applied to equality for girls/women's sport as well as protection from sexual harassment.

"Title IX was enacted as a follow-up to passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The 1964 Act was passed to end discrimination in various fields based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin in the areas of employment and public accommodation.[2][3] The 1964 Act did not prohibit sex discrimination against persons employed at educational institutions. A parallel law, Title VI, had also been enacted in 1964 to prohibit discrimination in federally funded private and public entities. It covered race, color, and national origin but excluded sex. Feminists during the early 1970s lobbied Congress to add sex as a protected class category. Title IX was enacted to fill this gap and prohibit discrimination in all federally funded education programs'.
.