Transgender woman in Supreme Court case ‘happy being me’

FERNDALE, Michigan (AP) — Aimee Stephens lost her job at a suburban Detroit funeral home and she could lose her Supreme Court case over discrimination against transgender people. Amid her legal fight, her health is failing.

But seven years after thinking seriously of suicide and six years after announcing that she would henceforth be known as Aimee instead of Anthony, Stephens has something no one can take away.

Stephens says in an interview with The Associated Press that she’s “happy being me.”

The Supreme Court will hear Stephens’ cases and other cases Oct. 8 over whether federal civil rights law that bars job discrimination on the basis of sex protects transgender people, gays and lesbians.

The cases are the first involving LGBT rights since the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy, the court’s gay-rights champion.