Michigan recently passed a law that prevents public entities from providing health insurance for the same-sex domestic partners of employees. The ACLU is fighting this law on behalf of school teachers and city and county workers whose domestic partners will lose their health insurance coverage as a result of this law.
It has become a controversial topic. Should employees of public institutions, (such as teachers, postal workers, and other city or county workers), be allowed to have their domestic partners covered under the employee’s health insurance?
Every state in America legally recognizes the marriages of couples who are the opposite-sex of each other. However, not all states legally recognize marriages of same-sex couples. In those states, same-sex couples can be considered to be domestic partners. Not all states will extend the same legal protections to domestic partners as they will for couples who can chose to become legally married.
In Utah, the teachers and staff in the Salt Lake City School District are able to extend their health insurance to cover a domestic partner. This can include a domestic partner who is of the same-sex as the employee, or, it can include a domestic partner who is the opposite-sex of the employee.
The University of Wyoming offers health insurance vouchers to the domestic partners of employees, which can be used to help the domestic partner be able to afford health insurance. This can be used by a same-sex domestic partner of an employee, or by an opposite-sex domestic partner of an employee.
The Metro Government, in Louisville, Kentucky, extends health insurance coverage to the domestic partners of city employees. They chose to do so for two reasons. They wanted to be able to stay competitive with private companies that offer health insurance benefits for the employee’s domestic partners. They also wanted to “value all employees, and families, equally”.
Michigan, on the other hand, is not as interested in valuing all employee’s, and families, equally. A law has just been passed that bans many public entities from providing health insurance to the same-sex domestic partners of employees. Michigan is a state that does not legally recognize the marriage of same-sex couples. This means that employees who have a same-sex domestic partner cannot simply choose to get married, in order to keep their health insurance.
The ACLU has filed a federal lawsuit against Governor Rick Snyder, in order to strike down this law. They are representing school teachers, city workers, and county workers. These employees are about to lose health insurance coverage of their domestic partners, and, in some cases, of their children as well. The ACLU feels that the law serves no purpose except to discriminate against a specific group of people. It also says that this new Michigan law is unconstitutional.
Image by Marty Hogan on Flickr