Supporters of the president believe he enjoys broad public support on the transgender issue, especially on banning trans women and girls from female sports. A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found just 40 per cent of Americans support Trump’s order barring transgender people from the military, while 55 per cent opposed such a ban.
US Representative Nancy Mace, a Republican from South Carolina, has been one of the most vocal supporters of Trump’s transgender policies.
“Let’s be clear: biological sex is real, and no amount of wordplay will change that,” she said in a statement to Reuters.
“Transgender individuals, like all Americans, have the same rights under the Constitution. But those rights don’t include forcing others to deny biological reality,” Mace said.
At least one transgender activist lamented that much of the Democratic Party and other allies have failed to forcefully oppose the Trump measures, leaving trans people – an estimated 0.6 per cent of the population who are disproportionately the victims of crime – to fend for themselves.
“What Donald Trump and his sycophants are doing is essentially violence against trans people. It is essentially trying to erase us,” said Angelica Christina, a New York-based activist and board member of the Stonewall Inn Gives Back Initiative, a non-profit advocacy. “We will stand up against this oppression, but it is relentless.”
