Fair and Equal Michigan submitted petition language to the Board of State Canvassers on Tuesday to change language on the Elliott Larsen Act.
“The Elliot Larsen Civil Rights Act protects people from discrimination on the basis of things like their religion, nation of origin or sex, and we are trying to modernize the law by adding protections for the LGBTQ community on the basis of sexual orientation and the gender identity or expression.”
That’s Mira Jourdan from Fair and Equal Michigan who says the act needs to change its language to represent how society has redefined “sex”.
“So as a neuropsychologist my take would be that we’ve evolved our understanding of what sex and gender are as we have learned more about the human experience.”
This law would prevent employers from being able to fire someone because of their sexual orientation, gender identity or from how they express their gender identity.
“Individuals who present in a way that maybe people don’t expect often times are denied services based on a way that they express their gender..some of those individuals are transgender but many of them are not and this change would protect them from losing their job or their place to live on the basis of their gender expression.
If the Republican-led Legislature doesn't adopt the legislation, the initiative will attempt to gather over 200,000 signatures from local residents to go to a statewide vote in November. The initiative has backing from businesses, including DTE Energy, Consumers Energy, Herman Miller and Verizon.
Michelle Jokisch Polo, WGVU News.