Scapegoating Costs Lives

I would really like to be able to support California Governor Gavin Newsom. He's doing some good work to resist the Trump regime's anti-democratic incursions in our state. His Proposition 50, if it passes, may go a long way towards countering Republican gerrymandering efforts to keep control of the House of Representatives in 2027. He has joined other Governors to sue the Federal government over the loss of SNAP food assistance. He's signed some bills making it a crime for ICE agents to remain masked or unidentified (though we'll see if that has any teeth), and he's even signed a few bills protecting the privacy rights of transgender people in the face of threatened Federal investigations.

And I ask myself if his work will be enough to support him as Governor and prospective Presidential candidate, and then I think about an interview he gave this week on the same day that authorities in Vermont announced that Lia Smith, a transgender woman and college student from here in the Bay Area, had died by suicide, and I harden my resolve that I will never be able to vote for Gavin Newsom unless he changes.

Newsom infamously invited right-wingers onto his podcast earlier this year so that he could perform civility porn, finding "common ground". That common ground included banning trans youth from having appropriate healh care and participating in sports. I had hoped that he would walk back those sentiments in recent months as he drew more praise for antagonizing MAGA intead of being conciliatory, but he still managed to disappoint.

While he signed some low-profile bills that will make it easier for transgender people to obtain legal name changes and seal records of their deadnames, his veto of other bills, one to clarify protection of gender identity in school curriculums, one that would allow trans people to obtain a year's supply of hormone therapy in the all-but-certain case of a national ban, and a third that would require insurers to cover PrEP for those at risk of HIV, showed that he is only willing to go so far as an ally.

Here is the interview he gave on KQED, our public radio station. where the issue of trans kids in sports came up.

He did a good job defending his record on transgender rights, but he just wasn't able to give up the lie that trans kids playing sports presents an insoluble issue of fairness that only a person with the wisdom of Solomon could address. Bullshit. I wrote about this in an earlier post, but here is a link to a John Oliver video that explains the issue really well. My take? Newsom knows he's full of shit, but wants to show how reasonable he's willing to be.

My fear is that Newsom is aligning himself with the idea that transgender people cost the Democrats the 2024 election by "going too far" and that the key to future victory is showing moderate Republicans and Independent voters how reasonable he is by scapegoating trans youth on the issue of sports. These supposed voters, who regret their votes for Trump and are supposedly only willing to support Democrats who are not beholden to the too-far-going transes, don't actually exist. Those who vote for Republicans because they hate queer people will never vote for a Democrat, especially someone like Newsom. Those who vote for Republicans for other reasons don't give a shit about trans people one way or another. Courting these voters is a waste of time. Recent elections and approval ratings show zero correlation between success and a candidate's stance on trans issues.

Nevertheless, this idea persists. A group of Democratic "thought leaders" published a new policy guide advising candidates to abandon "identity issues" in favor of kitchen-table economic policies, "identity issues" being code for policies that protect the rights of LGBTQIA+ people, immigrants, minorities, and women. The theme seems to be that working class voters will only accept policies that benefit them as long as they can hold onto their bigotry and hatred, you know, as a treat. But Democrats retreating from the concept of equality and dignity for all would be betraying everything the party is supposed to stand for.

Even if this strategy could help lead to electoral victory, the real life cost makes it not worth it. There may not be a direct causal link between Newsom's words and actions and the tragic death of Lia Smith, but there is a connection. I don't know what specifically drove Lia to take her life, but I know that this is a depressing and terrifying time for transgender folks in general and students specifically. Lia was a diver on the Middlebury College swim team. The NCAA decided to obey Trump's executive order on transgender athletes without putting up a fight, which means she would not have been able to participate on the team this year. It's not unreasonable to think that this and the threat of losing needed healthcare contributed to her state of mind.

If Gavin Newsom was the kind of leader who could say "transgender athletes are no threat to anyone", if he had the courage to sign a bill that would protect trans kid's healthcare, if he could say "you belong in our society and we will protect you" then maybe the Lia Smith's of the world could hold onto a glimmer of hope and choose to live. I'm sorry to say he is not that kind of leader.