White House Architect of Assaults Against Trans People Nominated for Appeals Court

by Harper Jean Tobin

The E. Barrett Prettyman United States Courthouse, which houses the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

The Trump/Pence administration is trying to stack the federal bench with anti-trans judges.

It’s not just Jeff “Satan’s Plan” Mateer who would be a threat to transgender people. President Donald Trump has nominated a whole squad of potential federal judges who have actively worked to make transgender people’s lives worse and more fearful, including Kyle Duncan, Stephen Schwartz, Matthew Kacsmaryk, and Steven Grasz.

One of Trump’s nominees for what’s often called the nation’s second-highest court is no exception. In fact, he has been working against transgender equality from inside the White House itself.

The calls are coming from inside the house. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Gregory Katsas currently works for President Trump as Deputy White House Counsel. His boss has nominated him for a new job on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit — the key court that hears many challenges to administration policies and regulations.

If that sounds like the fox guarding the henhouse, that’s because it is.

At his October 17 Senate hearing, Katsas admitted his involvement in a raft of divisive White House decisions, including:

• An executive order and a Department of Justice memo asserting a sweeping license to discriminate in the name of religion
• Cancelling the DACA program and putting young immigrant Americans at risk of deportation
• President Trump’s notorious Muslim travel ban and refugee ban
• The shameful voter suppression commission headed by Vice President Mike Pence
• The October 6 rule limiting access to contraception

Despite helping to shape these Trump administration actions, Katsas refused to commit to recusing himself from cases challenging these policies.

Gregory Katsas. Photo credit: Washington Post

As a senior Trump White House lawyer, Katsas must have been involved in designing other attacks on transgender people.

Specifically, we need to know about his role in approving:

• The October 4 DOJ memo arguing that federal employment law does not protect transgender people from being fired for who they are
• The September DOJ brief to the Supreme Court arguing for a constitutional right to discriminate against LGBTQ people
• The August Presidential Memorandum directing the Pentagon to implement President Trump’s ban on transgender people serving “in any capacity” in the Armed Forces
• The July DOJ court brief arguing that federal employment law does not protect lesbian, gay, and bisexual people from being fired for who they are
• The decision to abandon defense of the Affordable Care Act’s lifesaving nondiscrimination provision in federal court and to instead begin to unravel the regulations that ensure the provision is implemented
• The withdrawal in February of lifesaving guidance on equal opportunity for transgender students under the Title IX education law
• The withdrawal in February of Title IX guidance on preventing and responding to sexual harassment and violence in schools and universities
• The vetting of anti-trans nominee Jeff Mateer and other anti-LGBTQ nominees

Katsas must come clean about his involvement about these decisions, and commit to recusing himself from any case challenging the Trump administration’s anti-LGBTQ and anti-civil rights actions. Regardless, his service in the Trump White House fundamentally disqualifies him from a lifetime judgeship on the nation’s second most important court.

Harper Jean Tobin is Director of Policy at the National Center for Transgender Equality.

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