An recent “Equality for All” forum saw Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell and others describe the fallout of federal actions affecting members of the LGBTQ+ community and beyond – and what’s being done in response.
Speaking to a room filled with advocates and elected officials Tuesday, Campbell emphasized that amid a flurry of executive orders from President Donald Trump, civil rights protections and laws in Massachusetts still stand, despite changing federal policies.
“The landscape of the laws here, which at moments, are more protective than the federal landscape, still exists in Massachusetts,” Campbell said. “As hard as it may be, it's still a blessing to be here, because of the rights that are afforded us in this community.”
It was part of the focus of a “Equality for All” forum, co-sponsored by the Attorney General’s office and Western New England University’s Center for Social Justice.
The event in Springfield featured Campbell, as well as Tanya Neslusan, executive director of MassEquality - an organization devoted to fighting discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity and more.
Neslusan says a number of vulnerable populations are feeling panic as what amounts to “fear-mongering” at a national level continues to play out.
“It’s fear-mongering with these executive orders: they don't do anything in a vacuum: you need to change federal policy, but beyond that, we have protections in Massachusetts, we have laws in Massachusetts that protect our folks,” the executive director said. “Where I'm really seeing the concern are the ways in which these things may be able to impact us - a lot of that is tied to what if the government cuts off funding? What if the government cuts out funding to our hospitals, to our schools - that kind of thing and that's where we may see an impact.”
Up for discussion were the multiple actions taken by the Trump administration involving the LGBTQ+ community and others – from threatening to withhold federal funding over DEI initiatives to attempts to bar trans women from taking part in women’s sports to moving trans women inmates from women’s prisons to men’s facilities.
WNE Law Professor Jennifer Levi moderated the discussion. Also working as the Senior Director of Transgender and Queer Rights for GLAD, Levi added that some executive orders did not come as a total shock, such as an executive order seeking to bar trans people from serving in the military, but the extent of the vitriol accompanying them was something else.
“It's really alarming, and folks that I work with know I've spent a lot of time in DC the last couple months, and to have the lawyer for the government, to stand up and admit … that there's no basis for characterizing an entire group of people who have met conditions of service and put their lives on the frontline for a decade and more, and to call them liars and undisciplined and dishonest, is shocking and alarming," she recounted.
Levi took part in legal actions against Trump during his first term and is a part of other efforts in his second as well – including one that secured an injunction on the most recent transgender military ban attempt.
Speaking of injunctions, Campbell and her office have been part of multiple lawsuits challenging presidential orders, joining with other Democratic state attorneys general in the process. Efforts so far have included getting a court order to block a federal funding freeze implemented early on by the Trump administration.
The AG, along with others, described how, regardless of the executive orders, civil rights protections remain – and that amid of what seems to be widespread confusion, a need is emerging to simply address the public and say said protections still exist.
“Nothing has changed in terms of the civil protections that are afforded folks in this community, as vast and diverse as it is, in Massachusetts. Nothing. It is fear mongering, it is targeting and being strategic, of course, as well,” Campbell said. “But we have to continue to actually go to places to stress that because people think things have changed, that their civil rights have been thrown out the window and they no longer have protections in their schools, they no longer have protections in terms of access to healthcare, they no longer are protected in terms of discrimination of the job or other places.”
“You are in Massachusetts, you have a right to gender-affirming care here in Massachusetts, because of folks sitting in the front,” she continued, referencing various state lawmakers attending the forum. “We are updating our shield law to protect our providers in terms of data privacy and sharing of information - the shield law is still here as we work to update that.”
