Halloween might be over, but the scariest night of 2024 is still to come. With only a few days until election day on Tuesday November 5, we still need to keep up with the LGBTQ+ news headlines. As voting day approaches, it is important to remember what is at stake for the queer community, how crucial down ballot issues will be this year, and to make sure you’re brushed up on the things to know for voting while trans.
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Down ballot races are every bit as important as the Presidential election.
This week we got new insight into the effects of the anti-trans attack ads, as well as a push back against them. A democratic candidate made their own pro-trans healthcare ad to target wider issues. And Texas has managed to take up the majority of this week’s news cycle, and none of it is good.
More dangers coming from Republican anti-trans ads
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Anti-trans attack as have been out of control in this election. While there had been a rise in ads targeting trans people during elections in recent years, 2024 saw it all reach a new extreme. While we’ve seen that these have limited effect on voters, with most people finding them mean-spirited and serving as a turnoff, they’re having affects outside of the election. As well as making day-to-day life harder for trans people in general, the trans people who are shown in the ads without their consent have come out to speak about the problems it causes.
One trans woman featured in ads attacking trans inclusion is sports, Gabrielle Ludwig, said that she is in “fear for my life, for my family.” After Trump and other Republicans featured her in attack ads, she was called “it” by two EPN presenters and received an anonymous threat leading to police protection. The sentiment has been shared by other targets of the ads, and now Mack Beggs, a trans wrestler featured in Ted Cruz’s attack ads, is taking legal action against the ads.
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Voting has already started for the 2024 election. You’ve heard the rhetoric, but what do these candidates really mean for the LGBTQ+ community?
One ad with a pro trans healthcare message
Mel Manuel, who is trans nonbinary, is running for a seat in Louisiana’s House of Representatives. This election bodily autonomy is on the ballot through reproductive rights, access to healthcare, and the ability to receive gender-affirming care. Manuel’s latest ad targets all of these aspects with a voice over highlighting these points while they do their own HRT injection. In a campaign of attack ads against trans people, it’s a refreshing change of pace.
Everything’s worse in Texas
Texas instigates a trans bounty: Texas has been in the news plenty for their attacks on trans people lately, notably criminalizing giving gender-affirming care to trans youth, refusing to update the gender markers on drivers’ licenses even with a court order, and exploring whether they can undo previous corrections to trans people’s licenses.
Now, the state is issuing bounties on trans people using the correct bathrooms. Any person that is not a government official can now sue trans people for using the restroom that aligns with their gender. They can request damages of “not less than $10,000 for each violation.” The bounty goes as far as to specify that a person’s gender will be determined by their “original birth certificate,” meaning that trans people who have legally updated their birth certificate will still be at risk from this new rule.
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Rule changes in Republican led states might be aimed at suppressing and intimidating trans voters.
Charges against another doctor for providing gender-affirming care: Ken Paxton, the Texas Attorney General who is responsible for the new restrictive rules around gender markers on drivers’ licenses, has filed a lawsuit against a doctor. The suit claims that the El Paso physician, Hector M. Granados, provided gender-affirming care to multiple patients, breaking a law Texas Governor Greg Abbott signs last year preventing trans youth from receiving care that is not inline with their gender assigned at birth. This is the second case that has been brought as Paxton signals that the state has every intent on enforcing these laws that threaten to crop up in other states.
Cruz makes a classic anti-trans slip up: The worst thing about attacks on the trans community is the suffering it causes trans people. But when it also inevitably targets others as well when cis people are assumed to be trans because they don’t conform to gender norms. Ted Cruz has managed to fall victim to this with his attack ads. His campaign already used images of Mack Beggs, a trans man who was forced by Republican rules to wrestle on the girls team, in an ad decrying liberals wanting men in women’s sports. Now Cruz is in trouble for releasing multiple attack ads that picture two cis teenager girls, labeling them as “boys in girls’ sports.” The images were, of course, used without permission, and the teenagers’ parents are not happy.
The latest anti-trans legislative risk assessment map: Erin in the Morning’s Risk Map received one last update before election day rolls around. As anti-trans ads target so much of life and a raise in trans bans across the country, both the adult and youth maps have moved their national risk level from “moderate” to “high.” But the main news is that (unsurprisingly, given the above news from the state) Texas has now become the second ever state to receive Erin Reed’s “Do Not Travel” warning, joining Florida.♦
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There’s a lot at stake for trans people in this election. But it’s also set to be harder for us to vote in it. Here’s what you need to know.
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