Executive Orders, DEI Bans, and Transgender Federal Workers: Ashley T. Brundage on Protections and Well-Being
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2026/01/27
Ashley T. Brundage is the founder and president of Empowering Differences, a leadership and DEI consulting platform. A transgender woman, she has described overcoming harassment, discrimination, and homelessness while seeking stable work in financial services. Beginning as a part-time teller at PNC Bank, she rose to National Vice President of Diversity and Inclusion in under five years. She authored Empowering Differences and built a companion online leadership course outlining a four-step empowerment framework for cultivating organizational change. Based in New York City, she speaks on inclusion, organizational leadership, workplace culture, and belonging. She is the parent of two teenage sons.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen speaks with Ashley T. Brundage, founder of Empowering Differences and ex-PNC Bank VP of Diversity and Inclusion, about how federal policy shifts shape transgender employees’ work lives. Brundage argues the Civil Rights Act and Bostock decision protect against gender discrimination, yet new executive orders try to weaken enforcement and curb DEI training. She links inclusion programs to morale, communication, productivity, and revenue, while warning healthcare rollbacks disrupt care continuity, raise absenteeism, and increase costs. Common flashpoints include bathrooms, locker rooms, and pronouns, often fueled by misinformation. She highlights heightened risks for gender-nonconforming people, including “X” passport holders.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Which federal policy changes shape transgender and gender nonconforming federal employees’ daily work conditions?
Ashley T. Brundage: While the civil rights act of 1964 is clear to provide protection on sex (gender) discrimination and the Bostock v Clayton County supreme court ruling also protects transgender employees confirming the 1964 legislation (congress), it remains clear in the new trump term they intend to muddy the waters against the other branches of government.
Executive Order: #14168 seeks to overrule the courts and congress which has a direct negative effect on transgender employees of the federal government. This includes the estimated 15,000 military troops who have been serving our country. By removing these troops, we are putting other troops at risk by not having tenured replacements.
Also, Executive Order: 14173 which effectively bans DEI practices in the federal government. This action does harm by removing educational programs which serve our government employees to streamline productivity. For example, by helping to learn how to communicate with those that are different, employee morale increases and effectiveness as well.
Jacobsen: What measurable outcomes capture employee well-being?
Brundage: Turnover costs have a direct measurable amount for an organization. Employee surveys and satisfaction surveys also can provide some insight into well-being; however, these will typically overperform in large-scale organizations due to fear of having to do more work if scores are lower. Lastly, overall revenue can be a measurable outcome as well since organizations with high well-being scores tend to produce better on all metrics including selling more goods and services.
Jacobsen: How do healthcare coverage changes affect care continuity?
Brundage: To lose healthcare coverage or part of your coverage due to being a political wedge issue is a heartbreaking reality for many, it can force someone to have to take more time off work to find care elsewhere or via lower cost options in other states or countries. This lowers the employee morale and leads to higher costs.
Gender affirming care is what is under attack from most of these changes and it is highly hypocritical since most Americans leverage some type of gender affirming care on a regular basis. Remember that when people shave, color their hair, cut their hair, tattoos, Blue pills, birth control, Botox, makeup, GLP1, and so much more, it is a form of shaping one’s gender to match their internal sense of gender.
Jacobsen: Following from the last question, what about clinical outcomes and financial considerations too?
Brundage: The overall costs for fully inclusive health plans that offer coverage for transgender people don’t dramatically raise the costs for others because the employees using those services are now living healthier lives and the amount of people leveraging them is so small.
Jacobsen: What workplace restrictions are most commonly reported?
I’m not sure what this question is referring to but guessing around trans related bans?
Brundage: I would think bathrooms. Locker rooms, pronouns are the most typical attacks on transgender people besides healthcare which was already referenced above. These types of policies are usually based on misinformation. Pronouns are important to everyone, and cisgender males and females who have statistically more reversed feminine, masculine, or unisex sounding names leverage this more than trans people. Kelly/Kim are males, or Riley/Sam as females for example. For bathrooms and locker rooms there are already policies that protect people from anything that is negative. If someone wanted to harm someone in these spaces a policy blocking trans people would not stop them. It is important to instead focus on actual issues that matter to the majority people on a regular basis.
Jacobsen: How have shifts in nondiscrimination protections and enforcement altered reporting behavior?
Brundage: For the most part we have not seen shifts on nondiscrimination protections because these are largely done in blue cities and states and there are still some layers of protection federally through the supreme court. I think there is more misinformation and disinformation affecting people in this way as the news media has become more increasingly hard to measure truth each day.
Jacobsen: What populations are most vulnerable to compounded effects?
Brundage: Gender nonconforming people face the most adverse effects. Prime example is people who have passport marker X, they face many risks from healthcare access to negative treatment from their own government in some cases they are having their identity documents revoked.
Jacobsen: From a research-methods standpoint, what are the biggest threats to valid inference here?
Brundage: That transgender people have existed since the dawn of time, and many other cultures deeply respect our community. I have included a link here with some research on the historical context here.
https://www.hrc.org/resources/seven-things-about-transgender-people-that-you-didnt-know
Jacobsen: Thank you very much for the opportunity and your time, Ashley.
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