The gears grind slowly, but grind they do. First, Rep Moulton (D-MA), a relatively obscure Representative who announced doubts concerning trans-women competing, at least with his daughters, and the blowback he experienced.
But the next Democratic politician to explore these grounds isn’t obscure. Governor Newsom (D-CA) is considered a strong possibility for the next Presidential election, and now he’s jumped into the transgender sports controversy with both feet:
That history was top of mind for several Democrats last week, when the governor said in his new podcast that transgender girls and women participating in female sports leagues is “deeply unfair.” The comments made him the most prominent Democrat to buck the party and echo public opinion on an issue that helped shape the 2024 election and could be a political liability once more in 2028.
The episode quickly made good on the promise of the podcast, advertised as a place where the governor would “answer the hard questions.” Chief among those: Are there limits to the party’s support for transgender Americans?
“The issue of fairness is completely legit,” Newsom said on “This Is Gavin Newsom” last week. “And we’ve got to own that. We’ve got to acknowledge it.” [CNN/Politics]
There is nothing wrong with recognizing a legitimate issue and using it in the run-up to an election run. In fact, it’s part of the American way, these days, of running a campaign.
No matter how much alleged party activists run around screaming Nazis!, per Rep Moulton at the above link, and indulging in performative morality as if that qualified as perceptive intellectual discussion, this remains an issue that bothers large numbers of Americans:
A January New York Times/Ipsos poll found that 79% of Americans — including 67% of Democrats — said they believed female transgender athletes should not be allowed to play on women’s sports teams. A Pew Research poll released last month found that 66% of Americans favor laws that require transgender girls and women to play on the teams of the gender they were assigned at birth.
And, yet, according to Andrew Sullivan, decisions concerning trans-athletes are handed down as if on high, quoting science as it’s the final word, rather than the normal contingent knowledge and conclusions that any normal scientist would agree is the way of science.
I know both transmen and transwomen, and the only hidden agenda I own, when it comes to sports, is the importance of fairness for both cis and trans athletes. What does it mean?
That means we need to have a real, society-involving debate. We need to follow the rules of a liberal democracy, and transgender advocates need to stop being arrogant, abusive sods. It’s probably the only way to bring America back together on this issue – and an important step Democrats must take if they’re going to cease being highly unpopular, even in the presence of the deeply incompetent pack of autocratic 4th-raters that is the Republican Party.
