Finger-pointing was swift among Democrats and media pundits desperate for answers about what went wrong on Election Day. Many – privately – hold President Joe Biden is in charge. Others blames the operatives who managed the party’s last few campaigns. But some point to an issue that has less power in American politics: transgender rights.
“Democrats need to stop pandering to the far left,” said Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y. The New York Times on Wednesday. “I don’t want to discriminate against anyone, but I don’t think biological boys should play girls’ sports.”
Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., shared a similar view, he tells the Times Thursday: “Democrats spend a lot of time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest about the problems facing so many Americans. I have two little girls. I don’t want them to be beaten on the playground by a man or a former male athlete, but as a Democrat I have to be afraid to say that.” .
Representatives for Suozzi and Moulton did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In Texas, where the fight for transgender rights is going on especially severe in recent years to then-Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa He informed the local radio station about it “You can support transgender rights in all categories where the issue comes up, or you can understand that there are some things that we’ve gone too far that a large part of our population doesn’t support.”
Hinojosa he apologized At X on Wednesday, he said they “failed to communicate my ideas carefully and clearly” before resigning on Friday due to Democratic losses.
Brad Pritchett, interim executive director of LGBTQ advocacy group Equality Texas, condemned Hinojosa’s comments and the broader argument by some Democrats that trans people are contributing to Democratic losses.
“This is something Democrats have to stop and remember what their values are,” Pritchett said in an interview with NBC News. “We live and campaign for the values we hold dear.”
He also said Democrats should not “alienate” some of their most loyal supporters. Eighty-six percent of LGBTQ voters said they supported Vice President Kamala Harris, compared to 12 percent of those who supported Donald Trump. NBC News exit poll 10 major states.
Between the 2020 and 2024 elections, transgender rights have become a political flashpoint in the nation’s culture wars.
The American Civil Liberties Union estimates that thousands of anti-LGBTQ bills have been introduced in state legislatures across the country, most of them targeting transgender Americans.
Corporate America was also drawn into the fight with American brands like Bud Light facing a huge backlash for collaborations with trans influencers. And perhaps nowhere has the conversation ignited more than the issue of transgender girls and women competing in girls’ and women’s sports.
In 2022, transgender athlete Lia Thomas’ winning streak as a member of the University of Pennsylvania women’s swimming team made global headlines and conservative rage. Thomas’s Winning the NCAA swimming championships aroused special anger. This past summer, conspiracy theories that Olympic boxer Imane Khalif Algeria’s lack of women exploded online, drawing atypical attention to women’s sports at the Paris Games.
Throughout the campaign, Republicans spent more than $200 million on network television ads on transgender issues this year, according to data shared with NBC News by AdImpact, an analytics firm that tracks political ad spending.
Ads have aired repeatedly touting Harris’ past support for taxpayer-funded gender-affirming care treatments. During NFL and college football games last month. Advertisements “Perfection is for them; President Trump is for you.”
Harris has largely avoided the issue on the trail and in interviews, and was notably absent from this year’s Democratic National Convention.
Asked if she believes transgender Americans should have access to gender-affirming care in this country, Harris told NBC News’ Hallie Jackson. “It’s a decision that doctors will make in terms of what’s medically necessary.” She later said: “I believe that all people should be treated with dignity and respect, not be insulted for who they are and not be bullied for who they are.”
Harris campaign LGBTQ outreach director Sam Alleman urged voters not to blame trans people for Harris’ loss.
“Please don’t blame trans issues or trans people for why we lost” He wrote in X on Thursday. “No exit polls or data show this as a significant decision point for voters.”
Voters most often cited the “state of democracy” as their No. 1 concern, followed by the economy. NBC News exit poll.
Prominent transgender Democratic activist Brianna Wu told NBC News that the debate over trans rights has “changed dramatically” in recent years.
Wu ran unsuccessfully for Congress as a Democrat in 2018 and 2020 and now hosts a podcast about trans perspectives called Dollcast.
“This is my body, a message that I feel most comfortable with. Please let me do this and move on with my life, to be able to go into women’s locker rooms and women have to deal with seeing their penises in front of them, fully intact,” Wu said.
Wu thinks trans people have to compromise on what the wider public is willing to accept about trans issues.
“A lot of gay men put on khakis and went on daytime TV saying that love is love,” he said. “Yeah, it’s a little embarrassing, but you do what you have to do to talk to normal people.”