How life is changing for trans Americans under the Trump administration

Geoff Bennett:

Since President Trump reentered the White House, his administration has moved to restrict rights for transgender people, from transition-related medical care for youth to sports participation to identity markers on passports.

William Brangham has an update on these actions, the legal challenges to them, and what may come next.

William Brangham:

LGBTQ+ advocates say that many of President Trump's policies present a critical threat to the roughly 1 percent of Americans, that is some 2.8 million people, who identify as transgender.

So for a closer look at some of these moves, we are joined by Alejandra Caraballo. She's a transgender activist and civil rights attorney who teaches at Harvard Law School's Cyberlaw Clinic.

Welcome to the "News Hour."

Alejandra Caraballo, Harvard Law School:

Thank you for having me.

William Brangham:

After Trump won the election, you told The Harvard Crimson that these next four years would be really just a matter of survival. How has that survival been going?

Alejandra Caraballo:

It's been incredibly difficult.

The Trump administration has taken a whole-of-government approach to target the trans community, in everything from how we're able to identify ourselves on identity documents, to how we obtain our health care, to even where we go to the bathroom, and even the ability to serve in the military.

And so for the entirety of the trans community, it really has become a matter of survival, and that survival has been incredibly difficult.

William Brangham:

When you're talking to people in the community and people who are supporters and allies, do they share that same sense of dread as to what's going on?

Alejandra Caraballo:

Absolutely.

I think a lot of allies are incredibly concerned with what's happening. But I think, at the same time, it's difficult because there is so much happening. We're kind of only one small part of everything that is happening, between the assaults on our institutions, the attacks on immigrants, the open corruption in the government.

It makes it really hard to be able to focus what is happening to the trans community, when so much is happening all at the same time.

William Brangham:

Back during the election, political analysts point to that notorious set of ads that the president ran against Kamala Harris, she's for they/them, he's for you, as both being divisive and effective as an ad campaign.

And, as you know, there are polls that show that somewhere around half of Americans approve of what the president is doing vis-a-vis trans people. How do you explain that? How does that sit with you?

Alejandra Caraballo:

I think it's incredibly troubling, especially with the kinds of moves that has made for the trans community to even live our lives, to even access health care, to even access housing, or to even work without discrimination.

But I think the Trump administration, really, I think they're overplaying their hand and I think a lot of the Republican Party overlearned the lesson from 2024, where their economic populism was able to win over swing voters and they attributed it to anti-trans politics, because it failed in Virginia and it failed in New Jersey.

Winsome Earle-Sears spent over 50 percent of her ads been, according to NOTUS, on anti-trans ads, and she lost by, I think almost…

William Brangham:

This was in the governor's race.

Alejandra Caraballo:

Yes, by over 15 percentage points. And those were some extremely heinous anti-trans ads. And it just failed to materialize as any sort of impact on electoral politics, because, at the end of the day, people want to hear about things that actually affect their day-to-day lives, and trans people, it just doesn't register for them, for better or for worse.

When it comes to our issues in terms of like our access to health care and all those other things, it makes it very hard for us to get those policies. But at the same time, on the negative side, it doesn't have much saliency with the electorate.

William Brangham:

The Supreme Court, as you know, is about to take up a case next year about the participation of transgender athletes in sports. Again, over half of Americans believe that transgender athletes should not be playing in sports.

What do you think is at stake in that particular case?

Alejandra Caraballo:

Yes, I mean, there's, on its face, what's at stake in the case, which is a middle school girl just wanting to play sports with her friends. And let's not lose sight of that.

And there had always been these commonsense compromises, that you had to be on hormones for your two years. You can't just show up and just say, I'm a girl and play on the sports teams. That's not how it worked. There had been these compromises within the sports teams, within local school districts to figure out how to make this work.

And this instead is saying that the government's coming in and dictating who can and can't play sports. But it goes beyond that, because Title IX, which is at stake here, and as well as the Equal Protection Clause, really defines what counts as discrimination writ large in all the institutions of learning from local kindergartens to universities.

And so that could determine potentially how discrimination on the basis of sex impacts trans people across the country. We could see, depending on how this decision comes down and how it comes out at oral argument and how it's written, basically an endorsement of bathroom bans by the Supreme Court, facilities bans, a lack of any sort of protections within discrimination law for trans people in the context of education.

William Brangham:

I want to ask you one thing. You have faced your own share of criticism for some of the things you have written on social media.

Where do you see the boundaries in terms of how to have this debate, especially as it pertains to people who are near and dear to you?

Alejandra Caraballo:

I think about this a lot in terms of the incentives of social media and how it can incentivize a certain style of engagement.

But I think, in general, one of the things I have always tried to say and repeat, the quote is, be brutal to systems, kind to people. And I think that's one of the things that tries to guide me is, we need to hold people to account and hold systems to account, but try to be kinder to people.

And I certainly have tried to grow myself in this respect, and I know I have not always been perfect, but I think that's just an unfortunate side effect of social media.

William Brangham:

All right, that is Alejandra Caraballo from Harvard Law School.

Thank you so much for being here.

Alejandra Caraballo:

Thanks for having me.