We’ve been bringing you a roundup of the biggest LGBTQ+ news headlines for the past few weeks, and we’re going to keep doing that. We’ve tended to look for both the good and the bad news, and we’ll keep doing that too. While the news might be bleak, all is not entirely hopeless.
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Obviously, this week, the headlines have been somewhat dominated by the tragedy of the election. Even with that piece of crushing news and the stories that have developed around it, there are some brighter spots in the darkness. So let’s take a look at what you need to know from the past week, what you can take a modicum of solace from, and some things to keep in mind as we move forward.
LGBTQ+ candidates celebrated notable wins
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While the top of the ticket on Tuesday was an absolute catastrophe, there were some important wins for the LGBTQ+ community in other races. These included some historic firsts, most notably with Sarah McBride’s win. McBride was the first trans person to be elected to a state Senate, taking a seat in Delaware in 2020. She has now been elected to the United States House of Representatives, which will make her the first openly trans person to hold a seat in Congress. That win was already a big deal, but with the Republican wins this week, having a trans voice in the room has only become more important.
Zooey Zephyr won reelection to her seat in the Montana House. That win holds special significance after the Republican members of the House barred Zephyr from speaking on the floor in 2023 after she told them that banning gender-affirming care in the state would lead to “blood on their hands.” Multiple other LGBTQ+ people won their races around the United States, leading to the most LGBTQ+ Congress in history and stronger representation in government offices across the country.
What to know about HRT access
There’s plenty to be concerned about with a Trump presidency, and at the forefront of the minds of a lot of trans people is “will I still be able to get my meds?” The answer to that isn’t as bleak as it might seem. It will likely get more difficult, with greater expense being a huge barrier. It’s a complex subject, but our own Henry Giardina has got you covered with all you need to know on your HRT access here.
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We will find a way to get the care we need
Trans people are being blamed for the election loss
The pundit post-mortems on the election started before Georgia was even called for Trump. The blame game is going to come to plenty of places. When a party loses an election, it’s important to have a good scapegoat for it, at least while deeper studies workout what went wrong with the campaign. Exit polls show that young men and white women came out in support for Trump. Most people cited economic concerns and worries about immigration as their reasons for their vote. And polls leading up to the election made it clear that the anti-trans ads were not swaying voters’ minds. But now pundits and politicians are claiming that Harris lost the election because she supported trans people too much, despite barely talking about trans issues at all during her campaign. The claims are ludicrous and baseless, but lean into the attacks that Trump and other Republicans made, claiming that the Democrats were only concerned about trans rights.
We have to keep hearing about Elon Musk
With Trump’s election, it sadly seems that Elon Musk is striving to remain politically relevant (especially after reports that he joined Trump’s call with Zelenskyy). One of Musk’s many children, his daughter Vivian Jenna Wilson, joined many other trans people in suggesting she’d leave the country over Trump’s win. After the New York Post covered her statement, a transphobe misgendered her, prompting Musk to remind us all who he is (in case we forgot) as he claimed “The woke mind virus killed my son.”
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Elon’s trans daughter said that after Trump’s re-election, she doesn’t see her future in the US.
Same-sex marriage and abortion ballot measures
With Roe v. Wade overturned, several states had ballot measures to secure abortion rights, often by making an amendment to the state’s constitution. These measures aimed to address holes in protections for reproductive rights that had not been an issue because the precedent set by Roe covered access for the whole country. While it would mean attacking the wider LGBTQ+ community, Trump has signaled in the past a desire to appoint SCOTUS judges who will overturn Obergefell v Hodges (the case that legalized same-sex marriage in all states). With the fear of Obergefell being overturned in the future, several states also put ballot measures forward to enshrine same-sex marriage in their state laws.
Measures to protect reproductive rights were on the ballot in ten states. They failed in South Dakota, Nebraska, and Florida—although it is worth noting that Florida did actually vote 57.1% in favor, but the state required a super majority to pass the measure. These measures passed in Missouri, Montana, New York, Nevada, Maryland, Colorado, and Arizona. The ballot initiatives on same-sex marriage all passed in California, Colorado, and Hawai’i.
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