The US Senate He partially confirmed Kalpana Kotagal, President Joe Biden’s choice to serve on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, in which critics warn that it will force transgender attitudes on employers across America.
“I am deeply concerned about Kalpana Kotagal’s record of supporting transgender ideas,” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said. The Daily Signal in a statement Wednesday before voting Thursday not to confirm an employment lawyer at the EEOC.
“The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was created to fight discrimination and discrimination in the workplace,” Cruz said, “but the rising Left is trying to use the EEOC to push their employers, and based on Kotagal’s history, I think they’re going to use him to attack religious freedom and force his politics on companies.” from Texas.”
The legislature confirmed Kotagal by a vote of 49-47, mostly on party lines. Sen. Joe Manchin, DW.Va., built his party on Biden’s nominees, but other Democratic senators — as well as independents running against Democrats — sided with the party.
Not voting was Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., and three Republicans: Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Josh Hawley of Missouri, and JD Vance of Ohio. The offices of GOP lawmakers did not immediately respond to The Daily Signal’s request to explain why they did not vote for Kotagal’s nomination.
“It is clear from her previous work with organizations that are going to the left, including the group that wants to ban fossil fuels, that Mrs. Kotagal does not represent. West Virginia character and we’re going to prioritize the criminal justice system in developing coordinated solutions, which move our country forward,” Manchin told The Daily Signal in a statement Thursday. “Ultimately, I disagree with Ms. Kotagal because the EEOC should be as open as possible to the logic of consistency in decision-making. important to American workers and businesses.”
“There is no problem if the Senate confirms Kalpana Kotagal as a member of the EEOC,” Kevin Roberts, president of The Heritage Foundation, said on Twitter. “His appointment would turn the EEOC into a dangerous agency that would harm our businesses and our communities.” (The Daily Signal is an article of The Heritage Foundation.)
“Kotagal, if confirmed, could turn the EEOC into a spearhead for conservatives,” Reed Rubinstein, chief executive officer of America First Legal, told The Daily Signal in a statement Wednesday.
“Many large corporations promote gender stereotypes and punish employees who disagree,” Rubinstein argued. “But it seems likely that the EEOC will focus on small and private businesses, many of which do not have the resources to effectively deal with them.”
Rubinstein called on House Republicans to use “budget and oversight tools to destroy the EEOC” and said conservative lawyers should use the Freedom of Information Act “to investigate and prosecute to protect themselves. EEOC transgender records.”
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is responsible for enforcing federal laws that prohibit discrimination against a job applicant or employee based on characteristics such as race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, or genetics.
Kotagal will fill a position on the five-member EEOC. The two incumbents are Republicans who are elected byPresident Donald Trump (Keith Sonderling and Andrea Lucas), and two are Democrats appointed by Biden (Chair Charlotte Burrows and Vice Chair Jocelyn Samuels).
Kotagal’s confirmation not only gives Democrats a majority but removes a check on the committee’s advocacy of transgender policies.
The new member of the EEOC specializes in employment law and “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” also called DEI. He teamed up with director of film Fanshen Cox DiGiovanni and Stacy Smith, a professor of art at the University of Southern California, to create a template for the “combined rider,” a part of an actor’s or filmmaker’s partnership that requires diversity between creative and production professionals.
Among other things, the “inclusion rider” requires the company to keep real data – provided to “KATSWIRI” – to calculate how many of those who participate in the production process “identify as” transgender.
In 2021, Kotagal represented the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund at against Aetna forcing an insurance company to pay for “breast augmentation” surgeries for biological males who identify as females. Aetna agreed to revise its policies to consider medically necessary “breast augmentation” surgeries instead of cosmetic procedures for some policyholders who identify as transgender.
Critics say Kotagal will tip the EEOC’s decision in favor of promoting gender equality, which the five-member commission has already shown signs of supporting.
The The EEOC defined discrimination on the basis of sex—outlawed in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964—including sex and gender identity, even though Congress would not have passed the statute with such a definition in 1964. The EEOC challenged its declaration because of this interpretation, which the Supreme Court ultimately upheld in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020).
Yet the EEOC’s advocacy of transgenderism goes beyond the interpretation of state law.
Internal documents obtained by The Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project show that the EEOC’s studies unfairly depict the “genderbread person,” a picture that separates “gender identity” from “gender expression” and “sexuality at birth.”
Critics argue that adopting the term involves accepting the view that sex is a natural human construct, rather than an actual human condition that enables humans to reproduce.
Transgender Perspectives It consists of presenting “gender identity” as a successful act, so that changing one’s body to match the gender opposite to one’s gender is also defined as “affirmation,” not destruction.
Here are the senators who voted for Kotagal (both Democrats or independents running against Democrats):
Mark Kelley of Arizona and Kyrsten Sinema (I)
Alex Padilla of California and Dianne Feinstein
Colorado’s John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennett
Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Chris Murphy
Delaware’s Tom Carper and Chris Coons
Georgia’s Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff
Hawaii’s Brian Schatz and Mazie Hirono
Illinois’ Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth
Angus King of Maine (I)
Maryland’s Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen
Massachusetts’ Ed Markey and Liz Warren
Gary Peters of Michigan and Debbie Stabenow
Minnesota’s Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith
Jon Tester of Montana
Nevada Jacky Rosen and Catherine Cortez Masto
Maggie Hasson of New Hampshire and Jeanne Shaheen
Corey Booker of New Jersey and Bob Menendez
Ben Ray Lujan of New Mexico and Martin Heinrich
Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Chuck Schumer
Sherrod Brown of Ohio
Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden of Oregon
Bob Casey of Pennsylvania
Rhode Island’s Sheldon Whitehouse and Jack Reed
Bernie Sanders (I) of Vermont and Peter Welch
Tim Kaine of Virginia and Mark Warner
Washington Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray
Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin
This report has been updated to include The Daily Signal’s efforts to seek comment from Blackburn, Hawley, and Vance as to why they did not vote.
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