Amid shaky polling and a loosening grip on the Republican Party, Donald Trump is digging for votes—primary votes, that is.
And while Trump is wary of deeply unpopular GOP initiatives such as a national abortion ban and cutting Medicare and Social Security, Trump has seized on at least one Republican loser he's willing to exploit in the Republican primary. This week, Trump rolled out a policy proposal that effectively aims to erase the existence of transgender Americans.
Trump kicked off his video announcement by declaring "left wing gender insanity" an act of "child abuse," but his proposal promised to stomp out federal promotion of gender transitions "at any age."
Trump also pledged to advance a federal bill establishing that the "only genders recognized by the U.S. government are male and female and they are assigned at birth."
Trump further took aim at educators, stating, "As part of our new credentialing body for teachers, we will promote positive education about the nuclear family, the roles of mothers and fathers and celebrating rather than erasing the things that make men and women different and unique."
While Republicans targeting transgender youth with bathroom bills and sports bans has become standard fare over the last decade, declaring war on transgender individuals of every age is a new front in the battle.
“The biggest thing here is the pivot away from transgender youth to all transgender people,” said Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, executive director at the National Center for Transgender Equality, told Semafor's David Weigel. “This year is the first time we’ve seen actions, in states, going after adults. That is brand new for Trump.”
While Trump's pledges to write transgender Americans out of existence may indeed improve his standing with the continually merciless evangelical bloc, anti-trans cruelty is an electoral lead balloon in general elections.
Republicans keep re-running the play that has backfired on them in election after election.
As Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow told Semafor of the 2022 midterms, “Our election was largely a rebuke of this kind of politics — trying to demonize the LGBTQ community, specifically the trans community."
But Trump is desperate, and general election considerations are a long way off for him at this point. Right now, Trump is just trying to claw his way through the Republican primary, where anti-trans hate is a staple and Trump is vying to be hater in chief.
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