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- the difficulty of finding affirming foster placements. Further, due to their physical distance from friends and family, traumatic experiences, and potentially unstable living situations, all youth involved with child welfare services are at risk for being targeted by traffickers seeking to exploit children. Barring discrimination in child welfare services will ensure improved treatment and outcomes for LGBTQ foster children.
- (22) Courts consistently have found that the government has a compelling interest in preventing and remedying discrimination. For example, the Supreme Court of the United States found there to be a compelling government interest in eliminating sex discrimination in Board of Directors of Rotary International v. Rotary Club of Duarte, 481 U.S. 537, 549 (1987). Because discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity inherently is a form of sex discrimination, as held in Bostock v. Clayton County, 140 S. Ct. 1731 (2020), this Act furthers the compelling government interest in providing redress for the serious harms to mental and physical health, financial security and wellbeing, civic participation, freedom of movement and opportunity, personal dignity, and physical safety that re-
