Jennifer C. Pizer
Senior Counsel
CONTACT: Western Regional Office, 213-382-7600
Jennifer C. Pizer is Senior Counsel for Lambda Legal, the oldest and largest national legal organization committed to achieving full recognition of the civil rights of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and people with HIV.
Based in Lambda's Western Regional Office in Los Angeles, Pizer has handled cases to advance domestic partner protections and the rights of lesbian and gay parents, and to end sexual orientation discrimination in employment, education, health care and housing. Pizer also is a leading voice for ending marriage discrimination against lesbian and gay couples and currently serves as co-counsel for 15 same-sex couples, Equality California, and Our Family Coalition in the California Marriage cases.
Pizer advises policymakers in Sacramento and nationwide on laws to protect domestic partners. She co-drafted AB 205, California's comprehensive "Domestic Partner Rights and Responsibilities Act of 2003," as well as subsequent bills to clarify and expand the rights of registered domestic partners in California, and has consulted similarly with lawmakers in Oregon and Washington State. She also consults frequently with government officials on ways to ensure that public contractors offer equal benefits to all workers with families, irrespective of marital status and sexual orientation.
Pizer often helps local governments defend their domestic partner programs against attacks by religious conservative groups, and was co-counsel in the successful defense of AB 205 in two suits pressed by such groups. She currently is representing Guadalupe Benitez in litigation against her former physicians for withholding medical treatment due to her sexual orientation; the physicians claim a religious right to deny treatment to lesbians based on their Christian fundamentalist beliefs. This case already has resulted in the first published court ruling nationally affirming a gay patient's right to challenge a physician's discriminatory withholding of medical care on this ground, and presently is before the California Supreme Court on the question of whether a religious objection allows physicians to violate a state civil rights law.
Pizer represented Lydia Ramos in her successful court fight to retrieve her daughter after homophobic relatives took the child following the sudden death of Lydia's life partner; Ms. Ramos's testimony was central to the California Legislature's consideration of AB 205. Pizer represented Keith Bradkowski, a gay man whose partner was killed on September 11th, in his struggle for fair treatment from government and private assistance programs; her advocacy for Mr. Bradkowski helped to propel passage of AB 2216, which established inheritance rights for domestic partners in California. She also has been involved in multiple cases before the California Supreme Court seeking to strengthen the legal ties between lesbian and gay parents and their dependent children.
Outside California, Pizer helped an elderly gay man win a landmark Washington Supreme Court decision that a state rule protecting those in non-marital heterosexual relationships protects gay people similarly. She has helped win rulings under the Oregon and Montana state constitutions that government workers with same-sex life partners are entitled to domestic partner benefits for their family members. And in Alaska, she helped to defend the fair housing laws against landlords demanding the right to discriminate against tenants based on the landlords' religious beliefs.
Pizer is an adjunct professor at USC Law School and Loyola Law School. Prior to joining Lambda Legal, she was associated with Townsend and Townsend and Crew LLP in San Francisco for five years. Before entering private practice, Pizer was legal director of the National Abortion Rights Action League and served as a federal judicial clerk. She is a 1987 graduate of New York University School of Law, and a 1982 graduate of Harvard College.
