Judge tosses lawsuit challenging civil rights agency's pullback on transgender workplace protections

A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit alleging that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is unlawfully refusing to enforce workplace protections for transgender workers.

Chief Maryland District Judge George L. Russell III dismissed the case on Friday, saying the court lacks jurisdiction over the complaint, and plaintiff FreeState Justice, a Maryland LGBTQ+ advocacy group, lacks standing to pursue it.

“While deeply troubling, the Court agrees with Defendants that the EEOC’s decision to alter its investigations of gender identity discrimination claims constitutes a discretionary decision over which the Court lacks authority to review,” said Russell, a nominee of President Barack Obama, in a memorandum opinion filed Friday.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under the leadership of Chair Andrea Lucas, a Republican, moved swiftly to comply with President Donald Trump’s January 2025 executive order declaring two unchangeable sexes. The federal agency charged with enforcing laws against workplace discrimination has aggressively pared back protections for transgender workers, dropping lawsuits on their behalf as well as requiring heightened scrutiny for incoming discrimination complaints related to gender identity.

On behalf of FreeState Justice, legal advocacy groups Democracy Forward and the National Women’s Law Center sued the EEOC in July 2025, alleging the agency's “Trans Exclusion Policy” violates Supreme Court precedent, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Fifth Amendment’s Equal Protection guarantee, and the Administrative Procedure Act.

Liz Theran, senior director of litigation for education and workplace justice at the National Women’s Law Center, said the organization is reviewing the decision, and “considering our options. Regardless of the outcome of this case, transgender people deserve workplaces free from discrimination, and we will continue fighting to ensure that federal civil rights protections apply to everyone they were designed to protect.”

She added that "the EEOC exists because people who faced workplace discrimination often had nowhere else to turn. This agency is charged with enforcing civil rights laws and cannot single out workers it wants to protect. No one should lose access to federal protections because of who they are.”

The EEOC declined to comment on the lawsuit, and instead referred The Associated Press to the Department of Justice. The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The EEOC in its motion to dismiss argued that “allowing FreeState’s suit would thrust this Court into the role of an overseer that micromanages the Commission’s enforcement process,” according to court documents filed Oct. 15. “In the same way that a citizen cannot challenge the decision of the FBI or a U.S. Attorney to focus on certain kinds of crimes over others, FreeState cannot challenge the EEOC’s discretionary decisions about how to enforce federal antidiscrimination law," the motion reads.

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FILE - The emblem of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is displayed on a podium in Denver, Feb. 16, 2016. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)

A person is in custody in an investigation of a large cross set on fire in a well-known Chicago park, police said Tuesday.

The burning cross was discovered June 9 in Grant Park, where Barack Obama delivered his acceptance speech when he was elected the nation’s first Black president in 2008.

A man identifying himself as a 21-year-old college student told WMAQ-TV that he was the shirtless person in an image distributed by police when they were looking for a suspect. But police did not immediately say Tuesday if he's the person in custody. The man said he was protesting President Donald Trump and not making a racist statement.

“I did know about this historical relevance beforehand. But I didn’t know the severity, how racially motivated it may seem from what I did,” the man told the TV station. “Cause my protest has nothing to do with race, nothing to do with gender.”

Cross burnings in the U.S. have historically been seen as symbols of hate and intimidation against Black people and have often been connected to the Ku Klux Klan.

The Chicago Police Department's communications office confirmed that a person was in custody in connection with the case, but no other details were released. An email seeking comment from the prosecutor's office was sent Tuesday.

“I can’t speak to anyone’s motives. We can only speak to the impact. And the impact was devastating," Mayor Brandon Johnson, who is Black, said when asked about the cross and the man’s remarks to WMAQ.

The man interviewed by the TV station said he was protesting the “ruling class” and Christian nationalists who support Trump. He said he put a red hat on the cross to signify a MAGA hat worn by the president's allies.

The man said he doesn't consider what he did a hate crime.

“I understand why it was interpreted that way, and I apologize for that, but no, the intent was not there,” he said.

Gina Miranda Samuels, faculty director of the Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago, said the man seemed sincere that he was not trying to send a hateful message to Black people.

This framegrab from a video taken by motorist Keinika Carlton shows a wooden cross engulfed in bright orange flames as it leans against a tree in Grant Park in Chicago on Tuesday, July 9, 2026. (Keinika Carlton via AP)