Apple, eBay, Microsoft, Twitter and a host of other tech giants joined 55 major U.S. businesses in asking a federal appeals court on Tuesday to allow a Virginia high school student to use the restroom that he chooses.
Apple, eBay, Microsoft and others are reviving their support in a transgender rights court case
They’ve filed another amicus brief backing Virginia high school student Gavin Grimm.
For the second time this year, companies offered their legal aid to Gavin Grimm, whose case had been slated to be heard by the Supreme Court in March — until President Donald Trump ended a policy by his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, that essentially prevented schools from discriminating on the basis of gender identity.
Given the federal policy change, the Supreme Court at the time changed course and declined to hear the case. It sent the matter back to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals for further argument, and it canceled that court’s previous ruling in favor of Grimm, who was born female but identifies as male.
For that reason, his fight has to proceed on different legal terms — but on Tuesday, businesses sought to reprise their previous support.
In an amicus brief filed with the court on Monday, a total of 59 companies said that a restroom ban “adversely affects [their] businesses, employees and customers, and undermines [companies’] ability to build and maintain the diverse and inclusive workplaces that are essential to the success of their companies.” The companies noted that they employ transgender workers, and some of their workers have transgender children.
“Gender identity discrimination is a form of sex discrimination,” they continued in the brief. “Amici respectfully request that the Court consider the business consequences of such discrimination when rendering a decision in this case.”
Other backers from the tech industry include Airbnb, Dropbox, Flipboard, IBM, Intel, Pandora, Salesforce, Spotify, Slack and Yahoo.
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
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