On Friday, June 20, the Labor Department announced that they are preparing to extend the same rights that heterosexual couples receive under the Family and Medical Leave Act to homosexual couples as well, even in states where their marriages are not considered legal.
The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), according to the website of the Department of Labor,
“entitles eligible employees of covered employers to take unpaid, job-protected leave for specified family and medical reasons.” Same-sex couples have not been eligible for such protection because their marriages have not been qualified to be defined as “spouse” relationships in many states.
Labor Secretary Thomas E. Perez said, “The basic promise of the FMLA is that no one should have to choose between succeeding at work and being a loving family caregiver. Under proposed revisions, the FMLA will be applied to all families equally, enabling individuals in same-sex marriages to fully exercise their rights and fulfill their responsibilities to their families.”
The Department of Labor is making this proposal by publishing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), in which they ask “to revise the definition of spouse under the FMLA in light of the United States Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Windsor, which found section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) to be unconstitutional.”
The NPRM also includes a proposal to consider the legal status of same-sex couples not based on their state or residence, but the place in which the couple was married into, otherwise known as “place of celebration”.
