The CTU House of Delegates voted to adopt the following resolution at its December 5, 2018 regular meeting.
WHEREAS, a leaked memo from the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) seeks to redefine sex in federal law as “a person’s status as male or female based on immutable biological traits identifiable by or before birth,” and
WHEREAS, people who are intersex do not fit into categories of male or female even though they are assigned one of these two sexes at birth, and
WHEREAS, people who are transgender identify differently than the sex they were assigned at birth, and
WHEREAS, the implementation of this federal memo would erase transgender and intersex people from federal law, and
WHEREAS, this definition would deny transgender people protections under federal civil rights law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, and
WHEREAS, this proposal would limit equal access to health care, housing, education, and fair treatment under the law, and
WHEREAS, this proposal would functionally deny many trans people documentation of their identity, citizenship and immigration status, and the ability to travel freely, and
WHEREAS, this proposal compounds the threats already facing unions and union members in the expansion of Right to Work laws and the recent Janus vs AFSCME Supreme Court ruling, and
WHEREAS, the constitution of the Chicago Teachers Union states under Article 8 Section 4 that the union “shall not make any distinction among its members on account of” several identity markers, including gender, and
WHEREAS, the acceptance of this proposal would have detrimental effects on CTU members, students, and students’ family members who are transgender, and
WHEREAS, this proposal represents a challenge to the central principle of the labor movement, that unions stand for dignity, rights and equality for all workers, therefore be it
RESOLVED, that the Chicago Teachers Union condemns in the strongest terms the leaked Department of Health and Human Services memo that seeks to redefine sex in federal law as “a person’s status as male or female based on immutable biological traits identifiable by or before birth,” and be it further
RESOLVED, that we oppose the DHHS memo on the grounds that it promotes a broader context of transphobia and a climate of fear that makes our tasks of organizing and building power with our members even more difficult, and be it further
RESOLVED, that we stand in solidarity with all LGBTQIA+ people, most notably those who may be currently experiencing heightened stress due to harassment and discrimination as a result of the Department of Health and Human Services memo.
