A religious-rights group on Friday blasted a decision by Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge to reverse a Trump-era move that would have allowed faith-based groups running homeless shelters to decide which gender they consider transgender people to be.
The result will be that homeless shelters will be required to allow a transgender person who was born as male to sleep next to women, the Alliance Defending Freedom said.
Ms. Fudge announced Thursday that she is pulling back a rule that the Trump administration had been in the process of implementing when it left office.
The Trump policy would have allowed shelters to decide whether they consider a transgender person to be a man or woman, a potential issue in situations in which a transgender woman asks to stay in a women’s shelter.
But Ms. Fudge, in a move hailed by LGBTQ rights groups, said the Trump administration’s position would violate an Obama administration rule that’s still in effect. It requires federally funded shelters to consider people to be the gender they say they are.
Ms. Fudge said that allowing shelters to decide would open the door to discrimination against transgender people.
The debate is the latest in a number of questions that have arisen nationally over which gender to consider transgender people, in determining such issues as which bathrooms they are permitted to use, or whether transgender girls can compete on girls’ sports teams.
On Thursday, Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, a Democrat, vetoed a bill barring transgender athletes from competing in girls’ and women’s sports.
In announcing her decision, Ms. Fudge said access to “safe, stable housing and shelter is a basic necessity.”
“We are taking a critical step in affirming HUD’s commitment that no person be denied access to housing or other critical services because of their gender identity,” she said. “HUD is open for business for all.”
The Human Rights Campaign, a Washington, D.C.-based LGBTQ rights advocacy group, hailed the move.
“Safe housing is an essential right for every American, no matter their gender identity,” said HRC President Alphonso David.
But Kate Anderson, senior counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, said that Ms. Fudge is violating the rights of faith-based groups to decide, based on their beliefs, what gender they consider transgender people to be.
“The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under the Biden administration has abandoned women and girls under the guise of being ‘inclusive,’” Ms. Anderson said. “But it’s not ‘inclusive’ to force shelters to violate their faith or impose a blanket federal policy that forces vulnerable women to share space with men who claim a female identity.”
In 2018, the Downtown Hope Center, a faith-based women’s shelter in Anchorage, Alaska, faced an investigation by the city for violating a transgender person’s rights. The transgender woman was turned away by the shelter when she showed up inebriated.
Shelter staff said they considered the person to be a man. They worried about allowing the person to sleep in the same room as women, some of whom had been raped or were survivors of domestic violence.
The city eventually dropped the investigation when the Alliance Defending Freedom filed a lawsuit alleging that the center’s religious liberties were being violated.
Sherrie Laurie, the executive director of the Downtown Hope Center, wrote in an op-ed in the Anchorage Daily News at the time that the shelter wanted to have the right to define what it considers women to be.
Based on their faith, the operators of the shelter believe that “women is a biological reality,” she wrote.
• Kery Murakami can be reached at kmurakami@washingtontimes.com.
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