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By Rosario Marina

It took the Justice system three and a half years to tell the trans worker V, in complicated legal phrases, two words: you were right.

In 2013, V began working as an administrative assistant in the municipality of La Plata, Buenos Aires province. In May 2015, when Julio Garro was in the midst of his campaign to take over the municipality with the Cambiemos alliance, he said that it would never occur to him to “give a job to a transvestite.” What he would give her, he explained, was “psychological help.”

Because of those statements, V decided to report him to the National Institute against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism (INADI).

When Garro won the election and became mayor, it took a few weeks for her to be fired, along with sixteen other people who worked at Las Mirabal, a center that supports women who are victims of gender-based violence. Her contract was nearing its end, but they decided to let her go early. The explanation, which they later used in court, was that the city had declared an administrative and economic emergency. Therefore, they could terminate contracts prematurely.

Transgender employment quota law 

V then decided to learn about Law 14.783, which had been passed a few months earlier in the province of Buenos Aires. This law, now known as the trans employment quota law, states that 1% of public administration personnel must be from the trans community. Something that, of course, was not being followed.

While researching the issue, she came across the Center for Professionals for Human Rights (CEPRODH), where she met Luz Santos Morón and Luciano Sívori, who decided to represent her. In early 2016, they filed a lawsuit against the municipality for violating the trans employment quota law, demanding her reinstatement.

About three months later, the Administrative Court No. 4 of La Plata issued an injunction ordering the municipality to reinstate her. “It stated that the dismissal had been discriminatory and persecutory and that it violated the trans employment quota law,” V recounts now, after a process that, although she didn't know it at the time, would continue for many more months.

[READ ALSO: Map of the transvestite-trans job quota in Argentina]

She returned to her job, but the municipality's lawyers decided the situation wouldn't end there. They appealed the decision, arguing that there had been no discrimination "given the numerous municipal employees whose employment has ended, as evidenced by decrees 2134 and 2344 of 2015." In other words, many people were dismissed, so her case wasn't one of discrimination.

They also explained, in legal language, that the complaint she had filed against Julio Garro has not yet "reached a final conviction" and that Law 14.783 is not yet regulated.

The municipality appealed the measure

The Court of Appeals ruled in their favor. Up until that point, V continued working for the municipality, but she was afraid because they could fire her again at any moment. It was now September 2016.

Her lawyer appealed the measure, then the case reached the Supreme Court of Justice of the province of Buenos Aires, the highest judicial body in the province.

“It took the Supreme Court three and a half years to resolve it,” says V. She no longer works in the municipality, the decision no longer applies, but it is still a cause for joy and she knows it.

The municipal authorities were not pleased with the ruling. They don't understand why it's being released now; they believe it involves "old files."

According to municipal sources, V "received her contract payment." However, she returned to work by court order, and they appealed the decision.

A sentence for the future of transvestites and trans people

In the Supreme Court ruling of May 8, 2019, all the justices agreed that there was insufficient evidence of discrimination. However, three of them (De Lázzari, Pettigiani, and Soria) concurred that proving discrimination is extremely difficult, citing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a United States Convention, and even the preamble to our National Constitution.

Unanimously, they decided to grant the appeal for inapplicability of the law and revoke the precautionary measure imposed. In other words, they explain that the trans employment quota law is not being applied in the municipality of La Plata.

[READ ALSO: The courts ordered the regulation of a transgender employment quota in Buenos Aires City]

“Being a final ruling, it sets a precedent and establishes jurisprudence for trans or transvestite people who are working in a dependent relationship with the State and who may experience some kind of discriminatory or persecutory problems,” says V, who now knows all the twists and turns that the Justice system can have.

Three and a half years in the life of a trans person is almost 10% of their life expectancy.

It took the justice system of the province of Buenos Aires three and a half years to reinstate a job, and to say that there is a law that is not being enforced.

Because of her and others, V knows: “Many trans women have to wait through long processes to have certain rights restored. The wheels of justice turn so slowly. They don't move at the same pace as a person's life, especially considering that we have a life expectancy of 35 to 40 years. It took three and a half years for them to tell me I was right.”