Some Democrats are having a change of heart on transgender issues, saying that the party’s pandering to the identity-politics left is hurting it at the ballot box.
Democratic Reps. Tom Suozzi of New York and Seth Moulton of Massachusetts each noted the success Donald Trump and the Republican Party had with ads on biological males competing in women’s sports and said their own party was partly to blame.
“The Democrats have to stop pandering to the far left,” Mr. Suozzi told The New York Times. “I don’t want to discriminate against anybody, but I don’t think biological boys should be playing in girls’ sports.”
Mr. Suozzi, who won re-election in a swing district this week, lamented that “Democrats aren’t saying that, and they should be.”
Mr. Moulton also cited an unwillingness by Democrats and their presidential standard-bearer Kamala Harris to take a stand contrary to LGBTQ+ lobby groups.
“Democrats spend way too much time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest about the challenges many Americans face,” Mr. Moulton said Thursday.
“I have two little girls, I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I’m supposed to be afraid to say that,” he said.
Both men have records in Congress favorable to transgender rights, including playing on sports teams that accord with gender identity rather than biological sex.
Mr. Suozzi, for example, voted for the Equality Act, which would make gender identity and sexual orientation federally protected classes.
Mr. Moulton similarly backed House Democrats’ Transgender Bill of Rights, which, among other things, guaranteed trans athletes slots on sports teams according to gender identity.
Both men were endorsed by the Human Rights Campaign, according to a report in The Hill, and Mr. Moulton is a member of the Congressional Equality Caucus.
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
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