In May 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas held that portions of the EEOC’s 2024 guidance on LGBTQ+ workplace protections exceeded the agency’s authority. The vacated portions of the Proposed Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace (the “2024 Guidance”) deal primarily with the question of whether misgendering transsexual workers or denying them access to the bathroom that corresponds to their gender identities constitutes harassment on the basis of sex prohibited under Title VII.

It is not entirely clear what the significance is of this ruling. Does it apply only in the Northern District of Texas and nowhere else? Is it just about bathrooms? More importantly, what protections do employees have? What are employers supposed to do? Will this decision affect legal standards for discrimination? All of these and other questions that may come to mind are yet to be decided.

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We have closely followed the twists and turns of workplace issues and the laws that govern employment practices, including sex discrimination and sexual orientation discrimination, for years. Our website features many articles about workplace harassment, employment discrimination, and retaliation. For articles on our website specific to sex discrimination, see the last paragraph of this article.

Reach out to us If you believe that you are or were being harassed, suffered workplace discrimination, retaliation, or if you were fired because your sex or sexual orientation. Our Texas lawyers understand employment law. To contact us on our website, click here contact Kilgore & Kilgore. Or call us (214) 969-9099.

The Northern District’s Ruling Redefines LGBTQ+ Protections

The court concluded that the 2024 Guidance “contravenes Title VII’s plain text by expanding the scope of ‘sex’ beyond the biological binary.” It further determined that the guidance “contravenes Title VII by defining discriminatory harassment to include failure to accommodate a transgender employee’s bathroom, pronoun, and dress preferences.”

The court limited the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County to termination of employment, holding that only firing someone based on homosexuality or transgender status violated Title VII’s prohibition on sex discrimination. The Northern District opined that Title VII does not bar workplace employment policies that protect what the court sees as the inherent differences between men and women.

It should be noted that the Northern District’s ruling aligns closely with the President’s January 20, 2025, Executive Order “DEFENDING WOMEN FROM GENDER IDEOLOGY EXTREMISM AND RESTORING BIOLOGICAL TRUTH TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.” This Executive Order declares that: “Sex” shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female. ‘Sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity’.” However, defining the term “sex” for legal purposes is not ordinarily thought to be within the purview of the executive branch of government.

A Quick Recap of Title VII

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. In 1986, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a matter known as Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson, held that workplace harassment can constitute unlawful discrimination under Title VII to the extent it creates a hostile work environment.

In Bostock, the Supreme Court included discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity within the definition of sex discrimination. However, as the Court wrote,

“Under Title VII, too, we do not purport to address bathrooms, locker rooms, or anything else of the kind. The only question before us is whether an employer who fires someone simply for being homosexual or transgender has discharged or otherwise discriminated against that individual ‘because of such individual’s sex.'”

The issue of whether denying an employee access to the preferred bathroom, misgendering the worker, or requiring a certain form of dress based on sex at birth, was simply left for another day. In the larger context of Title VII, the unanswered question might be understood as whether these forms of conduct amount to harassment that creates a hostile work environment.

The 2024 Guidance

In April 2024, the EEOC stepped up to address that question. The guidance is unequivocal:

• Example 4 of the guidance makes it clear that refusing to use an employee’s preferred name or pronoun may constitute sexual harassment. (Note the use of the word “may.” Whether misgendering is sexual harassment that creates a hostile work environment and is therefore sex discrimination depends on the severity or frequency of the conduct, among other things.)
• The EEOC has also taken the position that employers are prohibited from denying employees equal access to a bathroom, locker, and/or shower that corresponds with their gender identities.
• The 2024 Guidance states that employers are prohibited from firing, refusing to hire, or taking assignments away from someone because customers or clients prefer to deal with an individual who has a different sexual orientation or gender identity.
• Example 9 in the guidance explores the use of derogatory epithets based on sexual stereotyping. In that example, Eric, an iron worker, alleged that he was subjected to harassment based on his supervisor’s perception that he was feminine. Such harassment included being called pu__y, princess, and fa___t, often several times a day.
• The EEOC has also taken the position that religious accommodations for employees with sincerely held religious beliefs do not include allowing that employee to create a hostile work environment for an LGBTQ+ coworker.

The Northern District’s response is similarly unequivocal. It has taken on the 2024 Guidance directly.

The EEOC under the current administration has now also included commentary in the published version of the 2024 Guidance that notes: “This document was approved by the Commission on April 29, 2024, by a 3-2 vote. Any modification must be approved by a majority vote of the Commission. On May 15, 2025, a federal court declared unlawful and vacated portions of this document as contrary to law (citation omitted). The court’s vacatur of the unlawful portions applies nationwide, not just to the parties in the case.”

What All of This Means for LGBTQ+ Employment Protections

The Northern District Court did not issue an injunction that would prohibit the kind of employer conduct described in the examples. In any event, on June 27, in Trump v. CASA, the U.S. Supreme Court severely curtailed the use of nationwide injunctions as a policy-making tool. The 2024 Guidance, commentary aside, can be changed only by a vote of members of the EEOC, but the EEOC cannot act at present because it lacks a quorum. The President has not appointed new Commissioners.

Kilgore & Kilgore Has Answers to Your Questions About Workplace Discrimination

If you believe that your employment rights were violated because you are lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender, or queer, take heart. Kilgore & Kilgore can help. to learn more about our employment rights practice, click this link Our Dallas Discrimination Lawyers Hold Employers Liable for Employee Rights Violations.

For additional information, see the following articles on the Kilgore website:

“Workplace Harassment and Discrimination are Illegal – Is it Legal to Fire LGBTQ People in Texas?“

“Supreme Court Rules That LGBTQ People Have Employment Protections Under Federal Title VII Law“

“New Federal EEOC Workplace Harassment Guidelines and Employer Liability.”

For an overview our employment law practice, click this link employment law.