The plaintiff, a gay man, participated in a gay recreational softball league. Subsequently, he received criticism at his job as a welfare services coordinator for Clayton Country, Georgia, for his sexual orientation and participating in the league. Previously he had received positive professional evaluations. In 2013, Clayton County conducted an internal audit of the funds the plaintiff managed and then dismissed him for “conduct unbecoming of its employees.” The plaintiff filed a case with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and, in 2016, he filed a pro se lawsuit against the county alleging discrimination based on sexual orientation, in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. His case was dismissed by the district court and such dismissal was affirmed by the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. The Supreme Court had to decide whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, prohibiting employment discrimination “because of . . . sex” encompassed discrimination based on sexual orientation. The Court held that it was a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to fire an employee for being gay or transgender. The court reasoned that the ordinary meaning of “because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin” was that firing an employee based on sex was a violation of the Act. This, in turn, applied to one’s homosexuality or transgender status as discrimination on the basis of this required employers to discriminate against employees based on their sex.
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