Community members react to Supreme Court's historic ruling on LGBTQ rights

Today local community members reacted to the High Court's historic ruling on employment rights for the LGBTQ community, many of them voicing excitement that they say is long overdue.

The supreme court handed a big win to the lgbtq community today, ruling 6-3 that an employer who fires a worker for being gay or transgender violates the law.

Kezi 9 news reporter emma withrow joins us live in the studio for a closer look at what this means.

Renee legal experts i spoke with call this a huge milestone for the united states --- one that students will be highlighting in their history books for years to come.

The decision by the high court dealt with three different cases.... in all three situations, the employers admitted that they fired the workers for being gay or transgender, but they argued that this didn't violate the civil right act., today... the supreme court told them they were wrong what's most surprising about this is two of the court's conservative members, neil gorsuch and john roberts, sided with the liberal justices to hammer down the 6-3 ruling.

Its important to note though that oregon was one of 21 states that already protected members of the gay community in the workplace since 2008..

But now... the rest of the country will have to follow suit.

I spoke to community members today and asked them what this ruling means to them.

It's wonderful now that legally we can't be discriminated against across the country but one thing that we need to look at now is that there is organizational homophobia it's absolutely a victory for the gay and trans communities and for activists who have been working on this for decades.

In fact, folks were working on employment stuff way before they were working on marriage equality.

Gash actually told me that the fight for marriage equality took attention from the fight for employment security for the gay and trans communities.

But never the less.... they now have legal standing in both issues across the country as of today.

Community members who i spoke with said today's win will be cherished... but the war for equality is far from over.

Reporting live in the studio... emma withrow kezi 9 news.