Three women, interns at SpaceX, spoke up about the sexual harassment they faced by other interns and men in senior positions, who went unpunished. SpaceX a dominant company in spaceflight, was founded by Elon Musk. Former intern, Ashley Kosak published an essay accounting events in which she faced sexual harassment by her male colleagues. She reported these instances to her manager and HR, but never received a response to those complaints. Following this shared experience, other former interns at the company shared their own experience of being sexually harassment or witnessing other instances of harassment.

In 2006, Tarana Burke began the Me Too movement to bring resources, support, and awareness to sexual violence. In 2016, the #MeToo hashtag went viral, and many began speaking up about their experience of sexual violence. This movement has had an especially large impact in the workplace. The awareness of sexual harassment began in Hollywood and spread to employment in restaurants and offices. The #MeToo movement calls for widespread change and accountability, especially in places of employment.

Employers are being scrutinized on how they handle complaints of sexual harassment and are expected not only to implement methods to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace, but to take proper steps to address the issue when complaints are made.

In August 2019, Illinois passed the Workplace Transparency Act (WTA), which among other things, requires all employers to provide annual sexual harassment prevention training to all employees. It also contains additional, industry-specific sexual harassment prevention training for restaurants and bars.

To help employers meet WTA's requirements, the Illinois Department of Human Rights (IDHR) released a model training guide to aid employers in meeting the set requirements. While employers may implement their own sexual harassment prevention training programs, it must meet or exceed the minimum training standards to be in compliance of WTA.

In June 2020, in a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court of the United States held that Title VII prohibits employers from discriminating against employees for being homosexual or transgender.

In Bostock v. Clayton Cty, 140 S.Ct. 1731 (2020), the Supreme Court addressed the scope of Title VII's protections for homosexual and transgender persons. The court reasoned that when an employer fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender, they are discriminated on the basis of sex, which has always been forbidden by Title VII.