Sen. Elizabeth Warren released a plan on Thursday aimed at protecting the rights of LGBTQ Americans, many of whose livelihoods hang in the balance as they await the Supreme Court's decision in three landmark discrimination cases.
The detailed, 12-page plan includes the creation of a new program to fight violence against transgender women of color; a nationwide ban on conversion therapy; and public manufacture of PrEP, a medication that dramatically reduces the risk of contracting HIV. It also includes support for legislation like the Equality Act, a bill that would ban discrimination against LGBTQ people in the workplace and elsewhere.
Warren was not the only candidate to release a plan around LGBTQ rights ahead of a CNN town hall on the issue Thursday night. South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay candidate running for a major-party presidential nomination, also released a plan, which includes a mentorship program for LGBTQ youth modeled on President Obama's My Brother's Keeper initiative. The two join other current and former 2020 candidates, including Beto O'Rourke and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, in rolling out plans specifically aimed at protecting the rights of LGBTQ people.
The plans don't encompass all the reforms that some LGBTQ rights advocates have been calling for in recent years. They don't, for instance, include calls to repeal FOSTA-SESTA, federal legislation aimed at reducing sex trafficking that many say has instead had the effect of driving up violence against trans women of color. They also don't include pledges to decriminalize sex work, though Warren writes in her plan that she is open to decriminalization.
