Trans job seeker's 'rights' may have been violated when Hooters denied employment application: NY Human Rights Division

Trans-identified male Brandy Livingston has brought a lawsuit against Hooters, a restaurant chain known for its scantily-clad female waitresses. Livingston claimed discrimination after the location outside of Albany, New York denied Livingston’s three employment applications filed with the restaurant. Livingston has filed a claim with the New York State Division of Human Rights and after an investigation on their part, they found Livingston’s rights may have been violated.

Livingston was a regular at the Colonie location on Wolf Road and filed three applications to work at the chain. "I said, do you want to see my experience or anything? Because I had previous jobs I had written down. And he said, 'Oh, we don’t care about experience. We hire on the basis of personality. And there’s an image that needs to be met,'" Livingston told News10.

Livingston accused the workers at the establishment of discrimination, saying, "They would use male pronouns. They would refer to me as he." Livingston also claimed, "I overheard one of the servers after I left the restroom talking to one of the managers and said that, 'Why are you allowing him in the women’s restroom?' And the manager said, 'Oh, I don’t like it any more than you do.'"

A hearing is set for September 2025. The Division of Human Rights determined that Livingston's rights may have been violated under New York Executive Law 296, which states that it is unlawful "For an employer or licensing agency, because of an individual's age, race, creed, color, national origin, citizenship or immigration status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, military status, sex, disability, predisposing genetic characteristics, familial status, marital status, or status as a victim of domestic violence, to refuse to hire or employ or to bar or to discharge from employment such individual or to discriminate against such individual in compensation or in terms, conditions or privileges of employment."

Lawyers for Hooters have claimed that Livingston was told not to return to the restaurant because Livingston made sexually explicit comments to the servers on several occasions.

News10 confronted Livingston about Hooter’s claims, saying that "They just claimed that you had, prior to transitioning and after, you had freely made multiple servers at the restaurant uncomfortable by informing them you wanted to marry them, discussing masturbation." Livingston replied, "That I never said anything about."

The reporter also asked about a time in which Hooters said Livingston "had threatened to go to a gun range for practice for the next time you came to the restaurant."

Livingston replied, "My mom would take me to the gun range and for clay pigeon shooting, trap. I feel like one of the servers might have overheard what me and my dad were talking about and misunderstood what we were talking about."