I Don’t Care About Your Polling on Trans Rights

Another poll on trans rights has hit the national political dialog. The fallout has been predictable: talking heads and reporters circulating the write-up with an air of condescending concern: this is what we’ve been trying to tell you! Everyone HATES you and you brought it on yourself. It’s like I’m in the seventh grade again.

This latest polling from The Argument has affirmed the priors of many talking heads in the media and Democratic consulting class – specifically that trans rights are a damaging political issue for Democrats and should be avoided categorically. The results mostly echo what other surveys on these issues have shown: Americans have grown more supportive of restrictions on trans people’s existence in the last several years.

The numbers are depressing, I’ll admit. They don’t bring me cheer. But as someone who’s been out here paying attention to political rhetoric for the last ten years and also happens to be trans, I can’t help but feel pissed off knowing how avoidable this all was.

Which it was, by my professional estimation – avoidable. This is of course easy and free to say in hindsight, but we’re not working with counterfactuals here – we have evidence to infer what works and what doesn’t.

So let’s examine what didn’t work, because we don’t have to wander far.

In 2024, Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris lost to an opponent whose most memorable attack ad was a fear-mongering screed against trans people claiming that “Kamala is for they/them.” What made the ad particularly effective wasn’t its chosen subject area (trans people), but the message it conveyed: trans rights means resources taken away from you, the taxpayer. It’s an inverse of the kind of message framing Dems typically strive for; “the GOP is slashing Medicare to pay for tax cuts for billionaires,” for example.

Yet Kamala Harris famously did nothing to countermessage this hyperbolic talking point from her opponent. As Democratic leadership is wont to do, the Harris campaign completely ceded the playing field to the GOP on trans rights, avoiding the issue entirely during her 107-day campaign save for one pained response in an interview with Hallie Jackson where she said she would “follow the law” when it came to allowing gender-affirming care for minors. When pressed to articulate her values on the issue, Harris again defaulted to her canned line.

It’s a recognizable playbook from the Democrats – being so stubborn and afraid of an issue that they fail to show up in any meaningful capacity. A similar saga played out between Democrats and the issue of immigration. After years of GOP fearmongering over “migrant caravans” and the “threat” at the southern border, Democrats capitulated to the right on immigration policy in a major way just a decade after President Obama’s landmark DACA legislation. Democrats grasped for a message that was simultaneously pro-pathways to citizenship while attempting to meet voters’ rightward shift in opinion on immigration.

But what prompted that shift in the first place? Could the thousands of hours of GOP messaging on this issue, combined with the absence of principled, compelling Democratic messaging – a message that didn’t bear with fingerprints of their opponent’s framing, have had something to do with this? And is this not exactly what’s happening with trans issues right now?

Funnily enough, proponents of “moving on” from trans issues can’t point to any notable recent case in which the Democratic candidate took this tact and emerged victorious. From Andy Beshear in Kentucky to last November’s statewide races in Virginia and New Jersey, Democratic candidates have been able to successfully navigate these issues with voters on the campaign trail. I might not have chosen the same words that Beshear did when he said “all children are children of God,” for example, but you can’t say they shied away from the issue and retreated to canned defenses like Kamala Harris did.

What I don’t hear from these critics is a suggestion of what comes next if Dems are to capitulate once again. Most trans people I know are under no delusion about where we stand in the Big Tent party (clinging on by our nails but honestly not a club we care much to be associated with). There are some of us who still think working within the system has its merits and chafe at the suggestion that Democrats are only marginally better than Republicans on trans rights.

But we need to be clear-eyed about where the Democratic party actually stands on trans people currently. With a presidential primary about to begin in earnest, this is our best – and perhaps only – opportunity to influence the party’s platform before they inevitably tack to the center in the general election.

And I would argue that by and large, based on years of Twitter lurking and being in these conversations and group chats, we are a distracting sideshow to the party that they’d rather not deal with. Establishment Dems have adopted a sort of “cancer patient” posture towards trans people; obviously the cancer patient should get the treatment they need, but in a perfect world, there would be no cancer to begin with. It reminds me of how my well-intentioned mom would tsk tsk me back in the day for speculating that a friend might be gay. Do you really want a harder life for them? 

Being trans and queer is wonderful, and I would take the abrasiveness of trying to fit into this world over pretending to be someone I’m not every single time. Knowing and realizing one’s true self is a journey we are all owed. And that’s the kind of empathy and solidarity I want to see from Dems – to know that we aren’t some “interest group,” but a central tenet of your movement for a more just, fair and compassionate society.

Because the reality is, the issues trans people are advocating for intersect with everyone’s rights. By championing struggles like health care access and housing affordability, by attempting to break down gender norms, trans people are fighting for everyone’s rights – and by advocating for trans rights, you’re uplifting the collective good.

But putting aside the practicalities and tangible benefits that would come with embracing trans rights, the left just needs to stand for something, anything. It’s this lack of a proactive, affirmative agenda – across the board – that has catapulted Democrats to some of their worst approval ratings in history.

The transphobia will continue. In fact, it’s probably going to get worse. This isn’t me being cynical, but practical. We have to be better and braver. If the trajectory of immigration policy offers any portent as to what comes next, things are going to get much worse for trans people. And once public policy has ratcheted so far to the right, it’s going to be even more difficult to return to a more humane status quo.

So yeah, I really don’t care what polling says about trans rights! It’s not telling us anything new; the propaganda is working as designed and the right is winning on this issue as framed.

But data is not destiny, nor is it deterministic. We can choose moral courage over the comfortable path. Instead of calibrating our politics to what is most palatable to the masses, we can try good ol’ fashioned persuasion – a tool Democrats seem to have completely forgotten exists amidst their search for a backbone.

Many forget that the tactics and demands of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950’s and 60’s were quite unpopular in their time. Sixty years from now, who will we venerate from the fight for trans rights? Will the institutions that we expect to defend our existence emerge on the right side of history? I hope to be pleasantly surprised.