More than a dozen states held primaries or caucuses on Super Tuesday, the biggest day of the nominating races so far as the 2024 presidential campaign quickens pace. Primaries for a number of other offices have determined matchups for the general election in November.
President Joe Biden won every Super Tuesday Democratic primary state. GLAAD’s Biden Accountability Tracker has documented more than 320 policies, appointments and statements in support of LGBTQ Americans from the Biden-Harris administration’s first three years in office.
Donald Trump won all but one Super Tuesday Republican primary state, and his primary opponent Nikki Haley announced the following morning that she is suspending her campaign. GLAAD’s Trump Accountability Project has documented more than 200 attacks in policy and rhetoric against LGBTQ people in Trump’s one term presidency and current presidential campaign.
Haley did not endorse Trump for the Republican nomination. Trump faces four criminal trials that include 91 felony indictments, a half-billion dollar settlement for cases of defamation, sexual abuse and business fraud, as well as charges of election interference and mishandling of classified national security documents.
In North Carolina, Mark Robinson (pictured, below) won the Republican primary for governor. Robinson has repeatedly spread false and harmful rhetoric about LGBTQ people, including describing people as “filth” and “maggots,” as well as spreading sexist, Islamophobic and antisemitic rhetoric, quoting Hitler, and advancing a range of baseless conspiracy theories.
Allison Scott, Director of Impact & Innovation at the Campaign for Southern Equality said, “Mark Robinson is one of the most virulently anti-LGBTQ+ elected officials in the country…This is a man who has called LGBTQ+ people ‘filth,’ has helped make the North Carolina General Assembly a testing ground for extreme policies that harm all of us, and has called for transgender women like me to be arrested because of who we are. He wants a North Carolina where it’s prohibitively hard for us to exist.”
Campaign for Southern Equality is documenting Robinson’s record of anti-LGBTQ policy and rhetoric here.
In California, Rep. Adam Schiff advanced to the November election for U.S. Senate. Schiff is an outspoken supporter of LGBTQ equality including The Equality Act, which would provide comprehensive protections against discrimination for every LGBTQ American; expanding health care access and sponsoring the Equal Health Care for All Act, which would make access to care a civil right, without discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity; and opposing forced outing policies in schools that endanger LGBTQ student safety and privacy.
In Texas, Senator Ted Cruz won the Republican primary for Senate. Cruz’s record of targeting LGBTQ people via policy and false rhetoric is tracked on the GLAAD Accountability Project, including introducing legislation that would prohibit federal agencies from requiring workers to address other employees using pronouns that “contradict an individual’s biological sex.” Cruz has also introduced legislation targeting transgender students from school activities and criticized the Supreme Court’s ruling legalizing marriage equality as worse than the ruling upholding slavery.
Also in Texas, Rep. Colin Allred (pictured, below) of Dallas won the Democratic primary for Senate Tuesday. Allred, a member of the Equality Caucus in Congress, has affirmed his support for the LGBTQ community through legislation including voting in favor of the Equality Act in 2021. “No American should be discriminated against because of who they are or who they love,” Allred said in a 2021 statement. “The bipartisan Equality Act makes real progress towards ensuring that all LGBTQ Americans, no matter where they live, have protections under federal law.”
State Representative Julie Johnson (pictured, below) won the Democratic primary for Allred’s U.S. District 32 House seat Tuesday. If elected, Johnson would be the first out LGBTQ member of the U.S. Congress elected from Texas and the U.S. South.
“In many competitive primaries across the state, Texans turned out to say that they support LGBTQIA+ equality. Every member of the Texas House LGBTQ Caucus won their primary. Julie Johnson, founder and longtime member of the caucus, is one step closer to becoming the first queer member of Congress from the South,” Equality Texas President and CEO Ricardo Martinez said.
“In HD146, Lauren Ashley Simmons’ vote totals show that Houstonians are committed to privacy, liberty, and equality. All this goes to show that Texans are tired of the recycled attacks on our neighbors and attempts to divide us,” Martinez continued.
“State Representative Johnson’s primary win on Tuesday is a testament to the power of organizing efforts in Texas and her unwavering commitment to the LGBTQ community,” GLAAD CEO and President Sarah Kate Ellis said. “LGBTQ Texans deserve a seat at the table, in Congress and across the Lone Star State.”
Lauren Ashley Simmons, a member of the LGBTQ community and endorsed by Equality Texas, gained the most votes in the district’s primary, shy of 50%. Simmons is set to run in a run-off election to unseat Texas State Representative Shawn Thierry, who previously voted to ban books and ban transgender youth from life-saving health care.
Ellis added, “The results from Super Tuesday show a profound need for LGBTQ and ally voters to continue recognizing the power of their votes and voices to fight for LGBTQ equality and for everyone’s safety and freedoms. Our fundamental freedoms to be ourselves, to be represented accurately and without bias, to make our own health care decisions, to have our votes count, to read books about our lives and be safe in school, are all at stake in the 2024 election. Reporters must ask candidates about their records and proposals for LGBTQ people, and how they advance freedom and prosperity for all Americans.”
Additional background:
- Polling and turnout analysis from the 2020 election indicate that LGBTQ voters played a deciding role in the victory of Joe Biden for President and in key battleground states.
- LGBTQ voters make up approximately 11% of the electorate, a number predicted to grow to one in seven voters by 2030. 28% of GenZ is out as LGBTQ, the most out and racially diverse population cohort in history.
- An estimated 382,000 LGBTQ+ people live in North Carolina, and 26% are raising children,
- Voters can check their voter registration and learn about key deadlines at www.glaad.org/vote.