Rep. Sarah McBride of Delaware, the first openly transgender member of Congress, slammed the GOP Thursday after she was misgendered twice by a Republican colleague.
“I appear to live rent-free in the minds of some of my Republican colleagues,” McBride said to reporters at a news conference, the Hill reported. “I wish they would spend even a fraction of the time they spend thinking about me, thinking about how to lower the cost for American families.”
She added, “The Republican Party is obsessed with culture war issues. It is weird, and it is bizarre. And the American people deserve serious legislators, serious elected officials who are focused on bringing people together to deliver real results for the American people. Not to play games, and not to engage in schoolyard taunts.”
On Wednesday, a hearing for the House Foreign Relations Subcommittee was abruptly adjourned after Republican Rep. Keith Self of Texas, twice misgendered McBride. The Delawarean congresswoman retorted by replying, “Thank you, madame chair.”
Defending her own clapback during her Thursday presser, McBride told reporters, “I will not take a lecture on decorum from a party that incited an insurrection.”
McBride has been at the forefront of attacks since her move to Washington, D.C., late last year, though Thursday’s remarks were her first public comments on the matter.
Rep. Nancy Mace
When her Republican colleague Nancy Mace caught wind of her arrival, the self-proclaimed feminist began her press and social media tour throwing slurs at McBride.
Ultimately, Mace was able to work with House Speaker Mike Johnson to achieve a House Rule specifically targeting McBride: In all official buildings, people must use restrooms according to the gender they were assigned at birth.
Mace continues to misgender and attack McBride on her X account, writing that transgender people “groom” children and are “pervs.”
Transgender and other LGBTQ+ people have been a topic of contention with the Republican Party for quite some time. President Donald Trump used the minority population as a jumping-off point to introduce multiple executive orders targeting the community’s youth as well as adults in the military.
The president’s executive orders snowballed other legislation around the country as well. Iowa seemed to follow suit, passing a bill that removed protections for gender identity from its civil rights law, opening them up to discrimination and being denied things like car loans or facing eviction based on being transgender.
And these sorts of laws are having a bigger impact than what we see immediately on the surface. A recent study from The Trevor Project shows that policies negatively addressing LGBTQ+ people are having a deep impact on these children’s mental health. Many of the LGBTQ+ youth who are feeling cornered and specifically targeted by hateful policies are not only feeling depressed, but they don’t have access to or the means to get the help they need.
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