Large majority of Americans against LGBTQ discrimination: poll
Following the Supreme Court decision to protect LGBTQ rights in the workplace, a survey conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) showed that a large majority of Americans are against LGBTQ discrimination.
The poll showed a majority of Americans– including both Republicans and Democrats– think it should be illegal for either employers or healthcare providers to discriminate against LGBTQ people.
Americans against LGBTQ discrimination
The KFF survey looked into the public’s views on LGBTQ protections with the Trump administration’s move to remove healthcare protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as the Supreme Court ruling.
Nine out of ten adults (or 90 percent) said it should be illegal for employers to fire or refuse to hire people because they are lesbian, gay, or bisexual.
Nine out of ten (or 89 percent) likewise said it should be illegal for doctors or other health care providers to refuse to treat people because they are lesbian, gay, or bisexual.
With regard to transgender people, the same share of adults also said the same thing with 89 percent and 88 percent, respectively.
Moreover, 85 percent said it should be illegal for health insurance companies to refuse to pay for health care services for transgender people.
Laws needed to protect LGBTQ people
Another thing the poll noted was that nearly seven in ten adults support laws that ban discrimination against LGBTQ people. For lesbians, gay, or bisexual, this was 69 percent. For transgender people, it was 68 percent.
Interesting enough, this majority was across partisan lines with more than seven out of ten Republicans thinking that such discrimination against LGBTQ people should be illegal.
“Most Americans– including most Republicans– oppose discrimination against people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender,” KFF President and CEO Drew Altman said.
“The public is shifting more quickly on these issues than the political and legal landscapes are,” Altman noted.
The survey was conducted on June 16-21 from a sample of 1,001 adults over the telephone in English and Spanish.
LGBTQ people still facing discrimination
Other findings of the poll showed that most adults say that people who are transgender (79 percent) or are lesbian, gay or bisexual (74 percent) face at least some discrimination in the US today.
A smaller share are Republicans, i.e. less Republicans believe that LGBTQ people face discrimination.
Half or 49 percent of those surveyed said society has “not gone far enough in accepting people who are transgender.” This is up 10 percentage points from a 2017 Pew Research Center Poll.
The share of Republicans that say society has “gone too far” in accepting transgender people is about 30 percent. Only 24 percent of Republicans say society has “not gone far enough.”
More than a third or 36 percent say they personally know someone who is transgender. Nearly half or 46 percent of those are under age 30.