Rue Gilt Groupe
Companies who are/were a corporate partner of the The Trevor Project, an organization that advocates for controversial sex and gender ideology, including for children.
Companies that offer so-called transgender healthcare for their employees and covered dependents.
Rating Overview
Rating Criteria
Rating Criteria Detail
Corporate Weaponization
Criteria:
Has canceled customers, suppliers, or vendors due to their political views or religious beliefs OR corporately boycotts, divests, or sanctions regions, people groups, or industries.
Risk Level:
MediumRationale:
Rue Gilt Groupe received a score of 65 on the 2025 Corporate Equality Index (CEI) from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), a political stakeholder group. The company recruits employees based on sexual identity issues. The company discriminates against vendors that do not promote divisive sex and gender policies, indicating it prioritizes sexual issues over merit (1)(2). Rue Gilt has not publicly canceled customers, suppliers, or vendors based on political views or religious beliefs (3).
Criteria:
Charitable giving (including employee matching programs) policies or practices discriminate against charitable organizations based on views or religious beliefs.
Risk Level:
N/ARationale:
Rue Gilt does not publish charitable giving guidelines (1).
Criteria:
Employment policies fail to protect against viewpoint or other discrimination and/or are ideological in nature.
Risk Level:
MediumRationale:
Rue Gilt does not publish a nondiscrimination policy (1).
Corporate Governance and Public Policy
Criteria:
Uses corporate reputation to support causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.
Risk Level:
LowerRationale:
Rue Gilt has not supported ideological causes or policies (3).
Criteria:
Uses corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.
Risk Level:
HighRationale:
Rue Gilt’s HRC 2025 CEI rating indicates the company covers transgender related costs for its employees and their children, including paid short-term leave, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, chest surgeries, genital surgeries, medical visits and lab monitoring, travel and lodging. By allowing a political stakeholder group to dictate operations, the company increases health care costs and risks dividing employees, alienating customers and harming shareholders (1)(2). The company is a Bronze Tier corporate sponsor of the Trevor Project, an organization that advocates for controversial sex and gender ideology, including “gender transition” drugs and surgeries for minors, through legislation, litigation, advertising, and PR campaigns. The organization also hosts online chatrooms that allow adults to communicate with minors as young as 13 about sexually explicit topics. Adults in these chatrooms have encouraged minors to adopt transgender identities and withhold this information from their parents (3)(4)(5)(6)(7). In 2020, Gilt donated the proceeds of T-shirt sales to The Trevor Project, and Rue La La donated to GLSEN (8). In 2022, Rue Gilt Groupe donated 10% of retail sales to The Trevor Project (9). Otherwise, there are no publicly known cases of Rue Gilt using corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies (10).