Omar Gonzalez-Pagan (he/him/his) advocates for the civil rights of LGBTQ people and people living with HIV. Gonzalez-Pagan was instrumental in achieving two pivotal victories for LGBTQ people before the U.S. Supreme Court—Obergefell v. Hodges and Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia.

As a member of the legal team in Obergefell, he helped secure marriage equality nationwide. He also co-authored Lambda Legal’s amicus briefs in Bostock and EEOC and Aimee Stephens v. R.G. G.R Harris Funeral Homes, in which the Supreme Court held discrimination based on sexual orientation and transgender status is unlawful under the federal Civil Rights Act. 

As Health Care Strategist, Gonzalez-Pagan has been a leading advocate for the Affordable Care Act, particularly as it applies to LGBTQ people, and access to gender-affirming medical care for transgender people. In Doe v. Abbott and PFLAG v. Abbott, Gonzalez-Pagan put a stop to efforts by Texas to redefine “child abuse” to encompass the provision of necessary gender-affirming medical care to transgender youth. He has also challenged bans on the provision of gender-affirming medical care for trans youth in Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas in Soe v. Louisiana Board of Medical Examiners, Noe v. Parson, Poe v. Drummond, and Loe v. Texas. In Dekker v. Weida, Gonzalez-Pagan led the legal team that successfully challenged Florida’s ban on Medicaid coverage of gender-affirming medical care after a two-week trial.   

Gonzalez-Pagan is also counsel in County of Santa Clara v. HHS, representing a coalition of LGBTQ and reproductive health care providers and organizations against the Trump’s administrations denial-of-care rule, and has co-authored amicus briefs seeking to protect people’s access to reproductive health care, as he did in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, Zubik v. Burwell, and Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania.

Gonzalez-Pagan is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Cornell University.