The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently announced that it will administer and enforce the Fair Housing Act to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. The HUD announcement implements President Biden’s January 20, 2021 Executive Order instructing that all statutes which prohibit sex discrimination should be applied to discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, so long as the statute does not contain sufficient indications to the contrary.

In explaining its February, 2021 interpretation of the Fair Housing Act, HUD relied on the 2020 decision of the United Supreme Court in Bostock v. Clayton County which ruled that discrimination in the workplace based on sexual orientation or gender identity violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which prohibits discrimination “because of…sex”.