California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed four pro-LGBT bills into law. The bills address housing and health care needs for trans people, insurance discrimination based on HIV status, and the COVID-19 pandemic's effect on LGBT people.
“California has some of the strongest pro LGBT laws in the nation and with the bills signed today, our march toward equality takes an additional step forward,” Newsom said in a statement about the bevy of bills.
First bill was SB 132, which requires the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation will now be required to ask inmates about their gender identities and pronouns and house them accordingly. This comes just months after a federal judge ruled that calling a transgender person by their correct pronouns would show bias.
The governor also signed SB 932, a bill that will require the state to collect information about LGBT people and the COVID-19 pandemic. This bill was introduced to ensure that LGBT community will no longer be invisible, and they will be counted by public health system.
AB 2218, which Newsom also signed, creates a Transgender Wellness and Equity Fund in the state, which will go towards helping transgender, non-binary, and intersex individuals access housing and health care.
And the fourth bill was SB 1255, which is intended to fight discrimination in health care faced by people living with HIV. The bill, entitled the Equal Insurance HIV Act, says that the life expectancy for HIV-positive people has nearly doubled since 1996 and requires that life and disability insurance for HIV-positive people be treated similarly to insurance for HIV-negative people.
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