The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) on March 11 announced the launch of their Business Coalition for the Equality Act, an amalgamate of 60 major employers that have officially endorsed the bipartisan Equality Act introduced last July in Congress.
With operations in all 50 states, headquarters spanning 22 states and a combined $1.9 trillion in revenue, the companies that make up the coalition employ over 4.2 million people in the United States.
A majority of states—32 in total—still lack fully inclusive non-discrimination protections for LGBT people, and no explicit federal protections in the same vein exist. HRC and the corporate leaders composing the Business Coalition for the Equality Act seek to change that with this proposed legislation, which would finally guarantee explicit, permanent protections for LGBT people under our existing civil rights laws. The Equality Act provides clear, permanent and equal protections under federal law for all Americans in vital areas of life, such as employment, access to public spaces, housing, credit, education and federally funded programs.
“These business leaders are showing true leadership and fighting to end a shameful status quo that leaves LGBT people at risk in a majority of states for being denied services or fired because of who they are or who they love,” said HRC President Chad Griffin. “We’re proud of all these corporate leaders stepping forward to say that all Americans, including LGBT people, should be able to live free from fear of discrimination and have a fair chance to earn a living.”
Members of HRC’s Business Coalition for the Equality Act
- Abercrombie & Fitch Co.
- Accenture
- Airbnb Inc.
- Amazon.com Inc.
- American Airlines
- American Eagle Outfitters
- Apple Inc.
- Best Buy Co. Inc.
- Biogen
- Boehringer Ingelheim USA Corp.
- Broadridge Financial Solutions Inc.
- Brown-Forman Corp.
- CA Technologies Inc.
- Caesars Entertainment Corp.
- Capital One Financial Corp.
- Cardinal Health Inc.
- Choice Hotels International Inc
- Corning Inc.
- CVS Health Corp.
- Diageo North America
- Dropbox Inc.
- EMC Corp.
- Facebook Inc.
- Gap Inc.
- General Electric Co.
- General Mills Inc.
- Google Inc.
- Hewlett-Packard Co.
- Hilton Worldwide Inc.
- Hyatt Hotels Corp.
- IBM Corp.
- Intel Corp.
- Johnson & Johnson
- Kellogg Co.
- Levi Strauss & Co.
- Marriott International Inc.
- MasterCard Inc.
- McGraw Hill Financial
- Microsoft Corp.
- Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams
- Monsanto Co.
- Moody's Corp.
- Nike Inc.
- Oracle Corp.
- Orbitz Worldwide Inc.
- PepsiCo Inc.
- Qualcomm Inc.
- Replacements Ltd.
- Salesforce
- Sodexo Inc.
- Symantec Corp.
- T-Mobile USA Inc.
- Target Corp.
- Tech Data Corp.
- The Coca-Cola Company
- The Dow Chemical Co.
- The Hershey Company
- Twitter Inc.
- Unilever
- WeddingWire Inc.
HRC’s Business Coalition for the Equality Act launch comes after new polling released by the nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) found that nationally, support for a bill like the Equality Act topped 70 percent across all major political party lines.
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