Trump Goes All In on Anti-Trans

IS IT THE ECONOMY STUPID? Not for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. These days, its closing message on TV may as well be “it’s the trans, you fools.”

In the past five weeks, Trump’s operation has spent more than $29 million on TV ads criticizing Vice President Kamala Harris for supporting transgender surgeries for inmates and illegal immigrants in detention, according to data from the media tracking firm AdImpact. That makes the topic, by far, the biggest focal point when it comes to Trump’s ad spending—one of the best barometers of messaging priority there is. By contrast, the campaign has spent $5 million over that same time period on TV ads on the economy, making that topic their fifth-most emphasized.

posted by Rhaomi at 10:56 AM on October 24 [7 favorites]

In the past five weeks, Trump’s operation has spent more than $29 million on TV ads criticizing Vice President Kamala Harris

This was the only Trump campaign ad running at all, constantly, on Twin Cities stations for quite some time. Weeks? Only this one, many times a day, nothing else from the Trump side. Usual assumption is that such buys in the Twin Cities media market are aimed at northwestern Wisconsin (since Minnesota is not in play in the Presidential election).

They've flipped over in the last day or two to a Harris-is-the-same-as-Biden ad. But for a very long time, the ugly ad was on every day, all the time.
posted by gimonca at 11:18 AM on October 24 [3 favorites]

Yeah, the punch line on the Trump ad (seen during an out-of-region college football game was):

"She's for They/Them, not for You"

And when I think about it that sums up Republican voters. They're not as much voting for that man, they know his flaws, but forgive it because they hate you. They hate you so much that they want to vote for the person that will hurt you the most.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 11:25 AM on October 24 [20 favorites]

I don't know if this is mentioned, but since they've overturned Roe vs Wade, are they also now enabled to make homosexuality illegal again? Is everything since Stonewall getting reversed?
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 11:27 AM on October 24 [1 favorite]

1 EV away now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8urkDqSoc54
posted by torokunai at 11:32 AM on October 24 [1 favorite]

are they also now enabled to make homosexuality illegal again?
Abehammerb Lincoln

No, Lawrence v. Texas still stands, for now.
posted by star gentle uterus at 12:19 PM on October 24

Abehammerb Lincoln, I'm not sure there's a clear answer to your question, but there's a search feature at https://www.wecanstopproject2025.com/ that finds references in the Project 2025 manifesto itself AND some press coverage, so

https://www.wecanstopproject2025.com/find/lgbt

shows 11 references in Project 2025, but also these mentions in the press:

Project 2025: A Framework for the Erosion of LGBTQ+ Civil Rights , Commonwealth Club

Project 2025 Is Coming After LGBTQ Americans, The Nation

The stuff on page 481 about programs affecting families is disgusting and infuriating - the call to "maintain a biblically based" definition of marriage and family in the Department of Health and Human Services section is so utterly unconstitutional it makes my stomach hurt.


But in the bit of reading I've done of this horrifyingly long (and just plain horrifying) document, I've found it's not always easy to suss out all the ramifications of the things they plan. Like, there are only a few hits for "LGBT", but there are 125 hits for "court" and 23 more for "judge", so even without explicitly spelling out attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, the overarching plan to corrupt every American institution offers a million opportunities to harm everyone.

That's why I'm so grateful for things like the comics explainers highlighted right here in this FPP - because Project 2025's attacks on every aspect of US government - and thus, people's lives - are so stupefyingly all-encompassing that it can be hard to identify all the individual forms of damage it would cause.

Thank you so much for (re)posting this, MiraK. I appreciated the two previouslies, even though I don't think I managed to comment in either thread, and I think this project is awesome. Creative, caring people using their art to help save the world is one of my favorite things.
posted by kristi at 12:24 PM on October 24 [5 favorites]

i'm having a hard time trusting allies posting things about this when they inconsiderately throw trans women--i'm sorry, "AMAB people"--under the bus so blithely and carelessly.
posted by i used to be someone else at 12:31 PM on October 24 [7 favorites]

Hi - do some of the links look broken to any of you (e.g., Children, Climate, Cronies, EPA)? If so, does any one know how to raise the issue to the website creators? I'm using Google Chrome to view this.
posted by apcmwh at 12:39 PM on October 24 [2 favorites]

“Rescind regulations prohibiting discrimination on the basis of […] gender identity, transgender status, and sex characteristics.”

This right here is not about trans people it's about allowing an employer to discriminate based on any sexual characteristics. This would allow discrimination based on being a complely hetero cis woman (or man).

The conservatives plans are not about hate for minorities or trans people, or health care or abortion rights, they never have been and they never will be because they simply don't care. It is about, and always has been about maximizing profits for corporations. The bigots and anti abortion people are nothing but useful idiots.

The number must go up and the only stone left to squeeze blood from is the basic function of the federal government, before that can happen, regulations must be destroyed.
posted by kzin602 at 12:56 PM on October 24 [2 favorites]

The conservatives plans are not about hate for minorities or trans people, or health care or abortion rights, they never have been and they never will be because they simply don't care. It is about, and always has been about maximizing profits for corporations.

tell me, how does banning trans healthcare maximize profits for corporations? how do bathroom laws maximize profits for corporations?

maybe i just don't understand it, but please, explain to me and my fellow tr*nny compatriots how we must not understand our oppression?
posted by i used to be someone else at 12:59 PM on October 24 [15 favorites]

@apcmwh similar here, several pages with unloaded graphics and at least 1 forbidden
posted by aesop at 1:02 PM on October 24 [1 favorite]

i'm having a hard time trusting allies posting things about this when they inconsiderately throw trans women--i'm sorry, "AMAB people"--under the bus so blithely and carelessly.

whew, there are some pretty awful things in that thread. there's a lot of essentialism about gender, violence, and crime. i do think it's something...generally illustrative, about why a lot of queer people have trouble believing that liberals/democrats/Harris has their backs. there's a lot of tacking right that's already happened on "border security" and prosecuting drug crimes. obviously project 2025 is a horror, but it's a horror that's already playing out at the state level in a lot of places, and the response for what people there are supposed to do is often "vote!!!!" which, yeah, that's nice, but where do i vote for someone who will pack the courts* so that some of those laws actually stand a chance of being successfully challenged

(n.b. reading the harris/walz website, i noticed this:

She will also support common-sense Supreme Court reforms — like requiring Justices to comply with ethics rules that other federal judges are bound by and imposing term limits — to address the crisis of confidence facing the Supreme Court.

which i'm very happy to see in there.
posted by Why Is The World In Love Again? at 1:03 PM on October 24 [2 favorites]

I think the point being made was "rile up your rabid voting base with anti-trans ads and proposed legislation, then once in power, do what the Main Goal is, which is maximizing profits for corporations, cutting taxes and deregulating everything." I think the point was "the people in power don't really care one way or another about trans folk, they are just using this stuff to get into more power to accomplish their real agenda."

Meanwhile, lots of innocent people get harmed.
posted by SoberHighland at 1:04 PM on October 24 [5 favorites]

well, yes. but in a thread about how this will affect trans people being told that it's not actually about trans people, you can imagine how that feels, i dunno. kind of aggressive? dismissive? minimizing of the harms?

you realize that when purported allies do these things it doesn't actually make any of it better, right? it's actually a little worse that allies don't see our concerns as meaningful by themselves?
posted by i used to be someone else at 1:08 PM on October 24 [15 favorites]

Yeah I really messed up on that thread. I fully deserve the censure both then and now - and I'm not expecting anyone's trust or looking for kudos/cookies/whatever by posting here. This isn't about me, and mods please feel free to delete and get someone else to repost if that would make it easier for people to engage.
posted by MiraK at 1:09 PM on October 24 [5 favorites]

I'm not sure "Your suffering isn't a primary goal, just a side-effect of what I feel is *really* important" is a good line of conversation, or one that's going to make marginalized people targeted by the topic of this post feel welcomed here.

Can we not?
posted by CrystalDave at 1:09 PM on October 24 [5 favorites]

i'm always kind of baffled by this idea that there's some "real agenda" that's being hidden in any way. i remember a lot of it when the muslim ban came down and there were a lot of (not-muslims) posting about how this was just a test balloon for the REAL FASCISM around the corner, which, presumably, was more real because it would be happening to them and not somebody else. it can be simultaneously true that the republican party is deeply committed to christofascism and unchecked capitalism.
posted by Why Is The World In Love Again? at 1:10 PM on October 24 [12 favorites]

honestly at this point i don't think you're the biggest problem in the thread, it's that guy who said it's not about trans people at all.

at least you apologized, even if the mods haven't edited the extremely problematic part of that comment out.
posted by i used to be someone else at 1:11 PM on October 24 [2 favorites]

FWIW, I agree with you "i used to be someone else," and will now step away.
posted by SoberHighland at 1:11 PM on October 24 [1 favorite]

are they also now enabled to make homosexuality illegal again?

It takes 5 votes on the Supreme Court and they seem to have at least one: "Justice Clarence Thomas argued in a concurring opinion [in Dobbs] .... that the Supreme Court “should reconsider” its past rulings codifying rights to contraception access, same-sex relationships and same-sex marriage." That included Lawrence v. Texas, the 2003 case in which the court ruled that state laws banning sodomy were unconstitutional.
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 1:35 PM on October 24 [3 favorites]

two.
posted by i used to be someone else at 1:39 PM on October 24 [3 favorites]

but rolling back marriage equality isn't about gay people either, it's about allowing an employer to discriminate based on any sexual characteristics. This would allow discrimination based on being a complely hetero woman (or man).

The conservatives plans are not about hate for minorities or gay people, or health care or abortion rights, they never have been and they never will be because they simply don't care. It is about, and always has been about maximizing profits for corporations. The bigots and anti abortion people are nothing but useful idiots.

The number must go up and the only stone left to squeeze blood from is the basic function of the federal government, before that can happen, regulations must be destroyed.
posted by i used to be someone else at 1:41 PM on October 24 [3 favorites]

anyway, with respect to anti-trans legislation, it's not just republicans, it's not just project 2025.

might i direct your attention to kosa (previously), which is sponsored by the democrat blumenthal and republican blackburn and passed the senate.

here's what blackburn had to say:

One of KOSA’s authors, Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, told an interviewer that the top things conservatives should be taking action on are “protecting minor children from the transgender in this culture” and social media, warning that the internet is where children are “indoctrinated.” She promoted KOSA in her answer too, leading many to think she would try to use the bill to censor transgender content online. Her office later clarified that the two statements were separate.

more. more.
posted by i used to be someone else at 2:10 PM on October 24 [10 favorites]

i used to be osmeone else: And it's not just KOSA. HR 736, the PROTECT Kids Act is currently moving through the bowels of the House and would serve as a de facto ban on allowing kids to socially transition at school without parental consent.

I want to be clear here. This is social transition. We're talking names and pronouns not hormones and not surgery. We're also talking forced outing of trans kids who want to socially transition. This bill is dangerous.
posted by SansPoint at 2:21 PM on October 24 [11 favorites]

I'm sorry if I broadened the discussion beyond the hideous anti-trans agenda. I'm just also worried about other parts of the agenda too. Was not at all trying to side line anyone. Apologies.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 2:25 PM on October 24 [1 favorite]

Once they define transition as a sex crime they've already defined us as sex criminals.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:58 PM on October 24 [2 favorites]

Breaking my self imposed mostly button to say that I too have concerns about poor 'ALL AMAB" MIraK posting anything trans. Fairly or unfairly. (Countdount to my comment being deleted without mod note in four.. three..)
posted by Jacen at 4:06 PM on October 24

As a trans person, if Trump wins, I'm gone.

Bottom line. I don't know where, I don't know how. Maybe it'll be trying to get a bus as far north as I can go and get into Canada, maybe it'll be trying to get to Europe, maybe it'll just be 300 units of R Insulin. But if Trump wins, I can't live here anymore.

I mean, there's also the old line about how to refresh the roots of the tree of liberty...
posted by mephron at 4:29 PM on October 24 [1 favorite]

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