Washington, DC—This week, the Senate Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) committee held confirmation hearings for two nominees to the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (EEOC). President Donald Trump nominated Daniel Gade, a veteran and professor at the United States Military Academy, to be commissioner, and Janet Dhillon, in-house counsel for Burlington, Inc., to be chair.
Harper Jean Tobin, NCTE Director of Policy, said:
Several senators questioned both Dhillon and Gade about their commitment to the current EEOC policy that discrimination based on an employee's sexual orientation or gender identity is illegal. Gade, who has never been an attorney and has no experience enforcing anti-discrimination laws, refused to commit on this fundamental point. Dhillon's answers were even more jarring: she suggested that the EEOC should abandon its past positions and join Attorney General Jeff Sessions in putting a seal of approval on firing LGBTQ employees for who they are.
We are very concerned that these nominees dodged basic questions about their willingness to follow the EEOC’s established legal positions and enforce our equal employment laws. The EEOC has sided with many courts over the last several years in defending the right of millions of LGBTQ Americans not to be fired simply because of who they are. Unless their statements are clarified, it is difficult to conclude that these nominees are qualified to lead the critical work of the EEOC.
