GLAAD RESPONDS TO SUPREME COURT DECISION UPENDING THE CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO ABORTION AND THOMAS THREAT TO OBERGEFELL, LAWRENCE

GLAAD, the world’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) media advocacy organization, is responding to the U.S. Supreme Court decision Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, and its devastating impact on women, LGBTQ people, and on the personal liberty of every American. GLAAD is also responding directly to the concurrence penned by Justice Clarence Thomas that calls for the court’s Obergefell and Lawrence rulings to be reconsidered. On the first day of Pride weekend in many major cities, and on the eve of Sunday’s 7-year anniversary of the Obergefell ruling, Thomas has made it clear that LGBTQ rights are the Supreme Court’s next target.

GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis responded on Twitter, and below:
“The message here is clear and distressing: Americans are losing protected access to abortion, a constitutional right they have valued for nearly fifty years, and other rights to personal liberty are at risk too. The anti-abortion playbook and the anti-LGBTQ playbook are one and the same. Both are about denying control over our bodies and making it more dangerous for us to live as we are. Both divide our country into free and less free, the opposite of what the United States should be. Our bodies, healthcare and our future belong to us, not to a meddling politician or extremist Supreme Court justices, and we will fight back. Thomas’s dissent is a blaring red alert for the LGBTQ community and for all Americans. We will never go back to the dark days of being shut out of hospital rooms, left off of death certificates, refused spousal benefits, or any of the other humiliations that took place in the years before Obergefell. And we definitely will not go back to the pre-Lawrence days of being criminalized just because we are LGBTQ. But that’s exactly what Thomas is threatening to do to the country, even as support for marriage equality is at an all-time high of 71% and more Americans are coming out as LGBTQ with each generation. Between this threat and today’s reversal of abortion rights, we can no longer trust that the Supreme Court is operating in the interests of the majority of Americans.”

Link to Sarah Kate Ellis response via Twitter: https://twitter.com/sarahkateellis/status/1540338700294537217

Justice Thomas’s concurrence begins on page 117 of today’s SCOTUS document: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf.Thomas writes: “In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell.”

Lawrence v. Texas was a 2003 opinion that decriminalized intimate same-sex relationships. Prior to this ruling, LGBTQ people could be arrested and jailed for intimate relationships.

Obergefell v. Hodges was a 2015 opinion that made marriage equality the law of the land.

Gallup polls showed increased support for marriage equality (June) and increased numbers of Americans coming out as LGBTQ (February)—including the fact that 1 in 5 members of Gen Z now identify as LGBTQ.

GLAAD’s Media Reference Guide (11th Edition) can be found here and specific entries on marriage and family are here.

The abortion ruling mirrors increasing restrictions on healthcare for transgender Americans. Nearly 250 anti-LGBTQ bills have been proposed in states around the country in 2022. Thirty-two seek to ban evidence-based, safe, effective and lifesaving healthcare for trans youth. Florida also announced a proposal this June to block Medicaid coverage for all gender-affirming care for transgender adults as well as youth. Every major medical association supports gender-affirming care as evidence-based, safe and lifesaving.