Washington (AP) – A member of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which has been abruptly rejected by President Donald Trump, says that she believes that her discharge and the move to change the committee that protects the employee from discrimination. ”
In an interview with the Associated Press, Jocelyn Samuel said that the measures that aim to implement Trump’s procedures against certain diversity and guidelines for gender rights – are illegal and indicate a more comprehensive role in occupational safety for women and minorities.
“I am concerned that the refusal to recognize the discrimination of trans people what it does not agree.”
Together with the EEOC commissioner Charlotte Burrows, Samuels was released on January 27, a week after Trump’s taking office. Samuels said her letter of discharge pointed out “my support for the provision of radical bidges management for the initiatives and also mentioned my refusal to defend women against extreme gender ideology. Again your words, not mine. ”
Samuels was nominated by Trump in 2020 and confirmed by the Senate. It was later referred to by former President Joe Biden, with her term in office until July 2026. Trump, she said: “I found myself as an acceptable candidate for a democratic seat in 2020. I am now being branded as a radical extremist. I think it is not mine the perspectives of the government that have not changed. “
The EEOC was created by title VII of the Civil Rights Act from 1964 as a non -partisan five -person body in order to protect workers from discrimination based on breed, gender, disability and other protected characteristics from discrimination. The US President appoints Commissioners and the Senate confirms them, but their conditions are staggered and should overlap the presidential conditions to ensure the independence of the agency. No more than three of the five commissioners can come from the political party of the President.
The two shots leave the agency with a Republican commissioner Andrea Lucas, whom Trump appointed EEOC chairman last week. A democratic commissioner, Kalpana Kotagal; and three vacancies that Trump can meet.
As soon as a republican majority is set up in the Commission, Samuel predicted an immediate rollback from the EEOC protection in a way that essentially becomes “harassment based on gender identity” in the workplace.
The EEOC examines and imposes punishments for employers who have violated laws, protecting employees from breeds, gender, disability and other forms of discrimination. The agency also writes influential rules and guidelines on how anti -discrimination laws should be implemented and conducts public relations and training at the workplace.
In recent years, the agency’s democratic and republican commissioners have been heavily divided into many questions. Last year, both Republican commissioners voted against recent guidelines that the satisfaction of transgender employees or the rejection of access to a bathroom that corresponds to their gender identity violated anti-discrimination laws.
The Commission is obliged to investigate all claims for harassment or discrimination at the workplace, and Samuels believes that these examinations are continued on paper in which transps are involved. “But the level of investigation, the resources that the EEOC will use in IT, and the likelihood that the EEOC would find it would be believed that discrimination has occurred … is fully selected,” she said.
The end result, she said, will “be incalculable damage to an endangered community”.
She also claims that its discharge is illegal and against the basic concept of independent agencies such as EEOC, Securities and Exchange Commission and the National Labor Relations Board. Such positions are deliberately designed in such a way that they overlap the presidential administrations and cannot simply be ended on the basis of political orientation. On the same day, on which Samuels and caves were released, Trump also dismissed Gynne A. Wilcox, board member Gynne A. Wilcox.
“I look at my legal options,” said Samuels. “I believe that this is an illegal termination on the long -standing precedent of the Supreme Court.”
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Associated press authors Alexandra Olson and Claire Savage contributed to this report.
