Gayes! A company that owns a McDonald’s restaurant franchise in Washington D.C. has been ordered to pay a former transgender employee $930,000 in damages due to violating the D.C. Human Rights Act.
The jury overseeing the landmark case agreed with the allegations made by the plaintiff Diana Portillo Medrano who said she was harassed during her time working for a Washington D.C.-based McDonalds.
“When you are sure of what you have experienced, no matter how much time passes, the truth will come to light,” Medrano said via her attorneys. “Our truth is our best weapon to achieve justice,” she said. “It is truth, justice, and faith in God that have helped me get here.”
The lawsuit, which was originally filed back in 2021 recounts Medrano's complicated history working at the iconic restaurant chain. Medrano was initially hired in 2011 as a customer service representative. After being recognized for her work she was promoted, two years after her promotion she began to transition as a trans woman.
In her suit Medrano also claimed that as she began her transition she was met with taunts from her supervisors and colleagues, who continued to deadname her, calling her by her previous name.
“Despite a successful five-year career with McDonald’s marked by raises, promotions, and awards and absence of discipline, Plaintiff Diana Medrano’s supervisors and co-workers subjected her to a barrage of taunts, laughter, ridicule, and harassment because she is a transgender woman,” the lawsuit said.
“Managers and supervisors routinely referred to her as male despite her expressed request that they respect her gender identity as female, encouraging coworkers to harass her relentlessly in like fashion.”
During a separate incident a supervisor allegedly disparaged Medrano for using the women’s restroom, and began yelling at her “What are you doing using the female bathroom?” and “You’re not a woman, you’re a man.”
After several incidents, Portillo officially filed a discrimination complaint with the D.C. Office of Human Rights. As revealed in the lawsuit, Portillo is an immigrant from El Salvador. Following her discrimination complaint, she was fired eight days later, on the grounds that she did not have legal authorization to work in the U.S.
Jonathan Puth, one of Portillo’s lawyers, revealed evidence presented during her civil trial showed the restaurant had knowingly hired other immigrant employees without proper legal work authorization and it had not been weaponized against them as it had with Portillo.