Transgender Woman Fired From Job With Georgia General Assembly

On Halloween 2006, Vandy Beth Glenn, unlike some of her costumed colleagues, came to work dressed in typical business attire.

For that, the former editor with the Georgia General Assembly was fired, as her then-boss recently acknowledged in court documents.

Weeks earlier Glenn Morrison had decided that it was time for a change — it was time to begin living a life of truth — as Vandy Beth. Ms. Glenn informed Beth Yinger, her immediate supervisor, of her recent Gender Identity Disorder diagnosis, and together the two decided it would best for Glenn to make her workplace debut on Halloween. Glenn dressed conservatively, wearing a knee-length black skirt and a red turtleneck sweater.

“I don’t think anything could have turned me back at that point,” said Glenn, who would not give her age. “I reached a point in my life where I said it was time to stop fronting. Besides, I thought it was well understood this was a medical condition.”

Her boss, Georgia Legislative Counsel Sewell Brumby, saw it differently.

“It makes me think about things I don’t like to think about, particularly at work … I think it’s unsettling to think of someone dressed in women’s clothing with male sexual organs inside that clothing,” said Brumby, in a deposition taken May 11th in U.S. District Court in Atlanta. He’s among the defendants in a federal suit filed by Glenn that claims her former employers violated the Constitution’s equal protection clause.

Brumby, who did not respond to interview requests, disagreed, according to court documents, though he anticipated legal retribution.

“I thought there was a strong likelihood that I would get sued, and I thought there was a strong likelihood that I would be criticized,” he said.

Though Glenn worked in a windowless office and had little, if any, contact with legislators, Brumby worried about their reaction. He maintained that retaining Glenn “would be extremely harmful to our work operations [...]”

“I think some members of the legislature would view that taking place in our office as perhaps immoral, perhaps unnatural, and perhaps, if you will, liberal or ultra-liberal,” he said.

Glenn is not suing for damages. She just wants her job back writing and editing state laws.

“I liked it a lot,” she said. “I loved the people. I liked being part of the machinery of government. And work was only four miles from home.”

Glenn mostly freelances now. And the self-described political moderate has become a transgender activist, testifying recently before Congress on behalf of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. Hearings resume Thursday. If the legislation had been enacted prior to Halloween 2006, Glenn would likely still have her job.

“The rule in Georgia is you can be fired for any reason,” said Glenn’s attorney, Greg Nevins, “as long as it’s not one prohibited by law.”

The state’s attorney, Richard Sheinis, filed a motion to dismiss last year, arguing that Glenn does not have legal grounds to sue because neither state or federal law mandates transgendered protection. In June, U.S. District Judge Richard Story ruled against the defense.

Regardless of how her case is decided, Glenn has no regrets.

“The most important thing [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] people can do is come out,” she said. “The way to solve problems like this is to show people how ordinary we really are.”