Terror for transpeople

Where decent people saw a frightening political murder, disgusting people saw an opportunity to stir and enlist hatred for political purposes.

Unhappily, it's fair to say that Charlie Kirk's Republican funders and political sponsors (but not the woman who loved him) got one bit of what they'd paid for after his untimely demise: yet another chance to stick it to transfolk and other gender nonconforming people.

Journalist Parker Molloy reports on the terror unleashed. 

... While the Heritage Foundation manufactures fake statistics to paint trans people as violent terrorists, actual terrorism is happening in the real world—and it’s targeting LGBTQ people.

In the week following Charlie Kirk’s death, there have been at least two attempted terrorist attacks explicitly planned as “revenge” against the LGBTQ community. Not revenge against any actual suspect or accomplice. Not revenge based on any evidence. Just revenge against random gay and trans people for something they had nothing to do with.

In Phoenix, a 49-year-old named Treven Gokey was arrested after threatening to shoot up a gay bar. He told police he wanted to be “a martyr for Charlie Kirk” and that “radical left violence breeds a far-right response.” When officers asked him about recent violence, he said it made him want to “harm others” to send a message. He’s now sitting in jail on a $250,000 bond, charged with making terroristic threats.

Meanwhile in Texas, Joshua Cole posted on Facebook about an upcoming Pride parade in Abilene: “fk their parade, I say we lock and load and pay them back for taking out Charlie Kirk.” He added, “theres only like 30 of em we can send a clear message to the rest of them,” before suggesting they go “hunting fairies.” The FBI arrested him the day before the parade. During questioning, he admitted he “did not believe that the gay pride event should be allowed.”

... Heritage claims — based on absolutely nothing — that “transgender ideology” drives violence. But in the real world, it’s anti-LGBTQ rhetoric that’s inspiring actual terrorist threats. These men didn’t need evidence that LGBTQ people were involved in Kirk’s death. They didn’t need facts. All they needed was the permission structure that years of demonization had already built.

And that permission structure got reinforced immediately after Kirk’s death. Conservative media blamed “the left” before anyone even knew who the shooter was. The day after the assassination, bomb threats forced evacuations at the DNC headquarters and multiple HBCUs. The apparatus of rage was already primed and ready — it just needed an excuse.

Cole, by the way, had already been arrested for making terroristic threats back in 2019. The court noted his “prior criminal history” and said his release would pose a “serious danger to any person or the community.” But sure, let’s create a new terrorism category for trans people who, according to actual data, commit less than 0.1% of mass shootings. ...

Meanwhile we're in a "government shutdown" because Republicans refuse to present a budget that enough Democratic senators will vote for to overcome a filibuster. The media mostly focuses on the vicious cuts that Republicans are trying to make to health care, cuts which Democrats reject.

But the Republican plan also includes poison pills designed to erase and even destroy trans lives and life. Erin In The Morning reports:

... There is one promising sign for LGBTQ+ people in all this: Democrats, by refusing to cave to Republican demands on both the full-year appropriations bills and the continuing resolution, have shown a degree of backbone critics often accuse them of lacking. ... When talks eventually turn back to funding the government for the full year, there’s hope that Republicans may steer clear of poison pills like the anti-LGBTQ+ riders that risk blowing up the process altogether. 

... Still, there’s reason for concern that the pressure of a shutdown could push Democrats to cave on key constituencies—LGBTQ+ people chief among them. The memory of last year looms large. When Republicans laced the House version of the National Defense Authorization Act with anti-trans riders, Democrats in the Senate, having control of that chamber at the time, had the chance to strip them out. Instead, leadership folded: they refused to allow a vote to remove the provisions and passed the bill intact, cutting off TRICARE coverage for gender-affirming care for the children of servicemembers. For many trans advocates, it was a stinging betrayal. 

Now the fear is of a repeat—only worse. This year’s House NDAA goes even further, piling on a military bathroom ban, a sports ban, a coverage ban, and more, and the same fears hold true for negotiations over the bills funding the federal government for the next year.

... Republicans—Trump chief among them—have made clear that anti-trans provisions are on the table for the full-year appropriations fight. In recent days, Trump used both a Truth Social post and a grotesquely offensive deepfake video of Chuck Schumer to hammer Democrats, accusing them of protecting transgender people in the shutdown fight and vowing to walk away from negotiations unless they conceded ground. On Capitol Hill, several Republican members echoed the line, blasting Democrats for supposedly backing “taxpayer-funded transgender surgeries” in the federal budget—a talking point pulled straight from the party’s broader anti-trans playbook.

But backlash can go either direction. This report continues:

At least one source told Erin In The Morning that congressional offices were inundated with calls from LGBTQ+ constituents on Tuesday demanding that their rights not be bargained away in the final FY26 appropriations deal. ... 

... call your congressmembers and demand that any negotiations over funding the government for the next year must not include anti-LGBTQ+ provisions pushed by Republicans in power.

Republicans needed a scapegoat to blame for the vicious harm they want to inflict on us all; trans people have been drafted to serve that function. They can't really be so afraid of such a tiny, less than 1 percent fraction of the 330 million of us, can they? Oh gosh, apparently they can and want everyone to share their fears. And beat up on the bogey, metaphorically and sometimes actually.

It's on all of us to ensure that MAGA can't pick off one tiny segment of our American body on the way to injuring all of us.