Google, Apple and Facebook are among 56 major companies that sent a letter Thursday to the Trump administration opposing any federal policy changes that define gender as based on one’s biological sex at birth.
The letter states that the companies, which represent more than $2.4 trillion in collective revenue, stand in solidarity with transgender, gender non-conforming, and intersex people.
A group of 14 LGBTQ+ organizations organized the effort and did so in response to a New York Times report that the administration intends to redefine sex and in doing so erase transgender protections from existing laws.
Under the proposed changes, 1.4 million Americans who identify themselves as a gender different from the sex to which they were born would effectively lose federal recognition of their identity.
“Recognizing that diversity and inclusion are good for business, and that discrimination imposes enormous productivity costs (and exerts undue burdens), hundreds of companies, including the undersigned, have continued to expand inclusion for transgender people across corporate America,” the letter reads. “Currently more than 80 percent of the Fortune 500 have clear gender identity protections; two-thirds have transgender-inclusive healthcare coverage; hundreds have LGBTQ+ and Allies business resource groups and internal training efforts.”
Those numbers have all increased over the past three years, showing inclusion is a growing trend.
The letter also comes at a time of increased violence against marginalized people. In 2016, a survey of 28,000 transgender people by the National Center for Transgender Equality showed that nearly half had been verbally and/or sexually assaulted.
“Transgender people are our beloved family members and friends, and our valued team members,” the letter reads. “What harms transgender people harms our companies.”
The statement was signed by the following companies:
Accenture
Adobe Systems Inc.
Airbnb
Altria Group
Amalgamated Bank
Amazon
American Airlines
Apple
Automatic Data Processing Inc. (ADP)
Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Ben & Jerry’s Homemade
BNY Mellon
Cargill
Cisco Systems Inc.
Citi
Clifford Chance
Corning Incorporated
Corteva Agriscience™, the Agriculture Division of DowDuPont
Deutsche Bank
E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company
Fastly, Inc.
Hogan Lovells International LLP
HSBC
IBM Corporation
Intel Corporation
Intuit Inc.
Iron Mountain
JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Levi Strauss & Co.
Lush Handmade Cosmetics
Lyft
Marriott International
MassMutual
MGM Resorts International
Microsoft Corp.
Nike Inc.
PepsiCo
Replacements, Ltd.
Ropes & Gray
Royal Bank of Canada
S&P Global
Salesforce
Sheppard Mullin
Sodexo Inc.
Splunk
State Street Corporation
The Coca-Cola Company
The Dow Chemical Company
TiVo Corporation
Trillium Asset Management
Twitter Inc.
Uber
Warby Parker
