Welcome to the latest edition of Heroes of the Resistance — GLAAD’s ongoing series highlighting positive changemakers for the LGBTQ community at a time of challenge and uncertainty.
In a significant recent victory, Senate Democrats came together unanimously to halt legislation at the federal level that would have banned federally-funded schools from allowing transgender girls to participate in sports, calling it a distraction intended to harm a small group of people. The bill, pushed forward by Republicans, had mirrored a dangerous executive order issued by President Trump that perpetuates myths and disinformation about transgender Americans. GLAAD’s fact sheet on transgender people in sports is here, outlining facts versus myths and the truth about commonly asked questions.
In Minnesota, lawmakers rejected a bill that also would have banned transgender girls from playing school sports. The defeat of the bill came as advocates spoke out about its discriminatory nature and slippery slope in harming not just transgender girls, but all girls who play sports. “This bill creates a path for intense scrutiny and harassment for the 200,000 Minnesota girls who currently play sports ages 5 to 18,” said Rep. Julie Greene, DFL-Edina, dispelling the misconception that banning transgender girls from sports would somehow make sports more safe for cisgender girls. “This bill puts all girls at risk,” she concludes. The Minnesota High School League has allowed transgender students to participate on teams for a decade without incident. Minnesota attorney general Keith Ellison agrees with killing the bill and fighting any federal effort to interfere in Minnesota’s human rights law, which Ellison says supersedes any attempt by the federal government to roll back protections for trans students.
In Montana, out transgender state representatives Zooey Zephyr and SJ Howell gave impassioned speeches on the House floor early this month in opposition to two extreme bills that would have removed transgender youth from their families and banned certain types of expression and participation at Pride marches and drag shows. “I am here to stand before the body and say that my life is not a fetish,” said Representative Zephyr, in response to disrespectful comments by the bill’s sponsor about transgender people. “When I go to walk [my son] to school, that’s not a lascivious display. That is not a fetish. That is my family.”
An impressive 29 Republicans broke party ranks in order to support the defeat of the bills. Representative Sherry Essman, a Republican, rose to defend Rep. Zephyr and chastised the bill’s sponsor. ‘I’m speaking as a parent and a grandmother. And I’m very emotional because I know the representative in seat 20 is also a parent. No matter what you think of that, she is doing her best to raise a child. I did my best to raise my children as I saw fit, and I’m taking it for granted that my children are going to raise my grandchildren as they see fit,’ she said.
“Everybody in here talks about how important parental rights are. I want to tell you, in addition to parental rights, parental responsibility is also important. And if you can’t trust a decent parent to decide where and when their kids should see what, then we have a bigger problem. … “Trust the parents to do what’s right, and stop these crazy bills that are a waste of time. They’re a waste of energy,” said Essman.
These steps forward represent the power of conversations, organizing, and efforts to build understanding around transgender people and LGB people more broadly. These efforts have also led to victories against Trump’s executive orders that blatantly discriminate against LGBTQ people, immigrants, women, and people of color.
Since Trump took office, multiple federal judges of all political affiliations have blocked enforcement and/or struck down these orders on the merits. Four federal judges to date have blocked Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship in the country. Two federal courts have blocked his ban on lifesaving health care for transgender youth 19 years old and younger; and another judge has blocked the dangerous transfer of transgender women inmates to male prisons that would have aligned with Trump’s effort to erase transgender people from federal law. A preliminary injunction has been issued against Trump’s anti-DEI executive orders seeking to eliminate important progress for marginalized communities.
Most recently, a federal court granted a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of Trump’s executive order targeting transgender service members. In the opinion, U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes stated that “thousands of transgender servicemembers have sacrificed—some risking their lives—to ensure for others the very equal protection rights the Military Ban seeks to deny them.” Judge Reyes held that banning transgender service members from the military violates the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution because it is discrimination based on transgender status and sex; and because “it is soaked in animus.”Judge Reyes continued: “Its language is unabashedly demeaning, its policy stigmatizes transgender persons as inherently unfit, and its conclusions bear no relation to fact.”
In Massachusetts, the city of Worcester approved a measure declaring the second-largest city in Massachusetts a sanctuary city for the transgender community. The move came in response to Trump’s executive order attempting to administratively erase transgender people under federal law. “I don’t care what your beliefs are, but to take the word ‘transgender’ out of the vocabulary in the federal government is just plain wrong,” Mayor Joseph Petty said. This makes Worcester at least the third city in the U.S. to pass such a measure.
In a sign of proactive movement in Washington State, Governor Bob Ferguson announced a new policy to speed up the efficiency of document changes for transgender and nonbinary people, which previously could take up to ten months: “Very proud to announce the Department of Health will now process all requests to change gender designation on birth certificates within three business days.”
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The Rev. Dr. Mark Suriano, pastor at the First Congregational Church UCC in Park Ridge, New Jersey, didn’t hesitate to speak out in support of the full breadth of his community in a letter to the Central Atlantic Conference United Church of Christ following inflammatory comments and threats to his congregation spurred by online harassment from the so-called Moms for LIberty – a designated hate group according to the Southern Poverty Law Center and a long history of anti-LGBTQ extremism documented by GLAAD. In his letter, Rev. Suriano quoted the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. “We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.” Despite the hateful incident on his congregants, Rev. Suriano expressed hope and gratitude for his community coming together stronger than ever. “I remain emotional about this physical manifestation of the ‘inescapable network of mutuality’ and the ‘seamless garment of destiny’ of which Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke. I also am overwhelmed by the beautiful truth that what affects one of us directly affects all of us indirectly,” he expressed.
And finally, progress continues internationally as well. In Uruguay, activist Collette Spinetti will become the first trans woman to hold a senior position following her selection as the country’s Human Rights Secretariat.
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