Attorney General William Tong joined a group of 15 state attorneys general calling on Target to support the LGBTQIA+ community and reject hate, intimidation and discrimination following threats over Pride merchandise.
The letter, sent to national retail chain Target during Pride Month, comes in response to Target’s recent removal of certain Pride-related merchandise from its stores and amid an increasing number if politically motivated attacks on LGBTQIA+ Americans. The attorneys general acknowledge that Target wishes to keep its staff members and customers safe from anti-LGBTQ+ harassment, vandalism and other criminal acts. The letter encourages Target to reach out to responsible authorities, including the co-signed state attorneys general, to help address any anti-LGBTQ+ threats and harassment in Target stores.
State laws protect against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in places of public accommodation, including stores. Attorney General Tong and the coalition of attorneys general offered unequivocal support to Target in protecting customers and employees from hate-based harassment, intimidation, threats and attacks.
“Target’s Pride merchandise was a public show of support for the LGBTQIA+ community during a time of escalating hate and discrimination. The threats and intimidation surrounding those products were despicable. Attorneys general across the country stand ready to protect the civil rights of Target’s employees, customers, and the LGBTQIA+ community against this hateful bullying,” said Attorney General Tong in a release.
Politically motivated attacks on the LGBTQIA+ community have escalated over the past two years. Radical state legislatures have adopted laws barring public schools from discussing LGBTQIA+ identity, hindering gender-affirming care, prohibiting transgender individuals from using bathrooms or playing on sports teams aligned with their gender identity, and restricting drag performances. The LGBTQIA+ community has increasingly been targeted by harassment and hate, including escalating threats of violence and a spike in baseless and pernicious, false accusations that LGBTQIA+ individuals seek to abuse or convert children.
Against this backdrop, Pride merchandise is one way for LGBTQIA+ people to receive community support, and to show that outspoken fringe voices do not represent the views of society at large. Target’s decision to respond to bullying, intimidation, and destruction in their stores by pulling some Pride merchandise, even if motivated by a desire to protect workers, sends the wrong message: that those who engage in hateful and disruptive conduct can cause large corporations to succumb to bullying, and that bullies have the power to determine whether LGBTQIA+ consumers will feel comfortable in Target stores—or anywhere in society.
In Connecticut and many other states, public accommodation laws protect against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. In Connecticut, legislation signed into law in 2021 gives the Office of the Attorney General authority to investigate and – where the evidence warrants – bring civil rights lawsuits to stop large-scale, systematic violations of existing constitutional and statutory rights. The legislation also allows the Office of the Attorney General to pursue civil enforcement of our state’s hate crimes laws.
The multistate letter was co-led by the Attorneys General of Massachusetts and Minnesota and joined by the Attorneys General of Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Illinois, Maine, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.