The legal landscape for LGBTQ+ Americans has shifted dramatically in both directions over the last decade. The Supreme Court’s 2015 decision in Obergefell v. Hodges established marriage equality as a constitutional right. The 2020 decision in Bostock v. Clayton County extended federal employment discrimination protections to LGBTQ+ workers. These were landmark victories, achieved after decades of organizing, litigation, and the courage of people who were willing to be visible when visibility was dangerous.
And now the same institutions that produced those victories are being used to roll them back.
Transgender Americans — particularly transgender youth — have become the primary target of a coordinated legislative campaign that has produced over 500 anti-trans bills in state legislatures since 2021. Bans on gender-affirming care for minors. Restrictions on bathroom access. Exclusion from school sports. Removal of LGBTQ+ content from school curricula. These laws are not about protecting children. They are about making transgender people invisible and their lives legally precarious.
At the federal level, executive orders have targeted transgender service members, eliminated DEI programs that protected LGBTQ+ workers, and reinterpreted civil rights laws in ways that narrow rather than expand protection.
The foundation of a just society is that all people are entitled to dignity, safety, and equal protection under the law — regardless of who they love or who they are. This is not a controversial principle. It is the core promise of American democracy, deferred and denied for most of its history, partially honored, and now under active attack.
What does a society that fully embraces LGBTQ+ equality look like? Submit your vision.