ACLU Reaches Settlement For Veteran Denied State Department Contractor Job Because He Has HIV
People With HIV Will No Longer Be Automatically Barred From Working With State Department Contractors
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The American Civil Liberties Union has reached a settlement on behalf of a U.S. Army veteran who was denied a security job with U.S. State Department contractor Triple Canopy, Inc. because he has HIV. According to the ACLU, the State Department has agreed to policy changes that will prevent people with HIV from being automatically barred from working under Department contracts in the future. While details of the settlement with Triple Canopy are confidential, all parties are pleased with the agreement.
“I’m relieved that I can finally put this experience behind me and move on with my life,” said John Doe (who is using a pseudonym to protect to protect himself and his family from further discrimination). “I feel a lot better knowing that this kind of discrimination shouldn’t happen again.”
The ACLU filed a lawsuit against Triple Canopy and the State Department in September 2008, charging that they illegally fired Doe in violation of the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans With Disabilities Act. In November 2005, one day before graduating from a training program for a job providing security for the Haiti embassy, Doe was told by a director for Triple Canopy that he could not be employed because the State Department would not allow workers with HIV to be deployed overseas. According to legal documents filed by Triple Canopy, its contract with the State Department required it to provide test results proving that employees are free of HIV. The contract also listed “suggested physical standards,” which included a requirement that all contractor personnel be “free from communicable disease.”
“Although we have laws barring HIV discrimination in both the public and private sectors, the government’s contract here seemed to require discrimination,” said Rose Saxe, a staff attorney with the ACLU AIDS Project. “While we have no way of knowing how many other people were harmed by these illegal policies, we are pleased that the State Department has made policy changes to prevent this kind of discrimination in the future.” According to the ACLU, the revised policy eliminates the requirement that contractor personnel be “free from communicable diseases,” and clarifies that an individual assessment must be made as to any individual’s fitness to do the job.
Doe, who was diagnosed with HIV in 2000, served his country for 20 years, until his retirement from the Army in September 2001. From 2004 to 2005, he worked for Defense Department contractors in Iraq, where he led security teams on military bases. In each of these jobs, the government was aware that Doe had HIV, and had no problem with him performing the jobs in war zones in Iraq. Like many people with HIV, Doe remains healthy with an undetectable viral load.
This case is the latest in a string of challenges against the U.S. government for discrimination against people with HIV in the workplace. In July 2008, the ACLU, advocating on behalf of a volunteer, persuaded the Peace Corps to eliminate its policy of automatically barring volunteers with HIV. In February 2008, the State Department settled a lawsuit brought by Lambda Legal on behalf of a Foreign Service Worker for HIV discrimination and agreed to eliminate its policy of automatically excluding workers with HIV.
While work remains to be done, the Obama administration seems to be taking its obligations under the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act seriously. In addition to the announced changes at the State Department, the Department of Justice recently issued new guidelines to state licensing boards and occupational training schools clarifying that it is a violation of the ADA to bar people with HIV from professions such as barbering, massage therapy and home health care assistance. Like the State Department contracts at issue here, licensing boards in some states have rules barring people with “communicable diseases” that were being interpreted to exclude people with HIV. By issuing these guidelines, the DOJ is telling states that these policies will not be tolerated. A copy of the guidelines are available at .
The legal documents filed in the ACLU case, Doe v. Clinton, are available at /hiv/discrim/38209res20081223.html.
In addition to Saxe, Doe is being represented by Leslie Cooper, Senior Staff Attorney with the ACLU’s AIDS Project; Arthur B. Spitzer, Legal Director of the ACLU of the Nation’s Capital; and Richard A. Rosen, Patricia Crowley Corcoran, Donna M. Ioffredo, and Ilana D. Waxman of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP.
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The ACLU is challenging a Tennessee law that criminalizes HIV status. This law unfairly prevents people from securing employment and housing. -
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Plaintiffs File Federal Suit to Overturn Tennessee’s Aggravated Prostitution StatutePlaintiffs File Federal Suit to Overturn Tennessee’s Aggravated Prostitution Statute
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Tennessee’s Aggravated Prostitution statute and related sex offender registration requirements are unconstitutional and violate the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), according to a federal lawsuit filed today against the state by the American Civil Liberties Union, the Transgender Law Center, and the ACLU of Tennessee in the U.S. District Court in Memphis on behalf of four Jane Doe plaintiffs and OUTMemphis, the state’s oldest and largest service provider for LGBTQ+ people. Plaintiffs argue that the Aggravated Prostitution statute is rooted in fear and discrimination, targeting people living with HIV for harsh punishment and forcing them to register as “violent sex offenders” for the rest of their lives. Criminalizing people with HIV defies evidence-based best practices and is patently unlawful as it singles out people living with HIV — a protected disability — for harsher punishment. “People convicted of Aggravated Prostitution must spend years in prison and then register as violent sex offenders for the rest of their lives – meaning they cannot access the housing, employment, healthcare and community life that they need to get back on their feet,” said Molly Quinn, executive director of OUTMemphis. “This statute solely targets people because of their HIV status and keeps them in cycles of poverty, while posing absolutely zero benefit to public health and safety.” “HIV stigma is becoming a thing of the past, and it’s time for state law to catch up. OUTMemphis fights so that queer people are free to live in safety, with dignity, and we believe everyone deserves that regardless of their HIV status.” Tennessee’s Aggravated Prostitution law was passed in 1991 at a time of national panic over HIV. The law targets people engaged in sex work, enhancing their charges from misdemeanors to felonies solely based on HIV status, making it difficult to find other employment. Since then, many states have moved on from criminalizing HIV, better understanding the rates and methods of transmission and the way criminalization is counterproductive to effective testing and treatment. New treatments such as Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) and Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) can reduce viral loads to undetectable levels, blocking the possibility of transmission. And yet, Tennessee state law enhances sex work from a misdemeanor to a felony, solely based on HIV status, which has long been recognized as a disability protected from discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Tennessee has no comparable law for any other infectious disease, even those that are more prevalent and transmissible than HIV. “Disability discrimination is illegal,” said Alexis Agathocleous, deputy director of the National ACLU’s Racial Justice Program, “and yet the Aggravated Prostitution singles out economically-marginalized people living with HIV for excessively harsh punishment. The results are predictable: Black women are the targets of this archaic, unscientific law – many of whom are simply trying to secure food, a place to sleep, or a way to meet their basic needs.” Entirely divorced from science, Tennessee’s law applies indiscriminately, ignoring that either party to a sexual encounter can ensure against HIV transmission in many simple and effective ways. “Each of us, regardless of our race, our genders, or our HIV status, deserves to be treated with dignity and respect and welcomed as full members of our communities,” said Milo Inglehart (he/him), staff attorney at Transgender Law Center. “With today’s filing, we join the ACLU, ACLU-TN, OUTMemphis, and our individual plaintiffs to challenge the counterproductive and discriminatory Aggravated Prostitution statute that unlawfully singles out people living with HIV, disproportionately impacts Black transgender and cisgender women, and places lifelong, punitive restrictions on those who are criminalized for trying to survive.” “The Aggravated Prostitution statute is a relic from when HIV first emerged in the 1980s and is motivated by fear, misinformation and discrimination — not sound science or evidence,” said Jeff Preptit, ACLU-TN staff attorney. “Instead of criminalizing HIV, which disproportionately targets transgender and cisgender Black women who are already socially and financially marginalized, lawmakers should invest in evidence-based public health responses to support people living with HIV to end the epidemic. 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