Trans people face rhetoric, disinformation after shooting

Anti-transgender rhetoric and disinformation in the days following the shooting at a Nashville Christian school that killed six people have heightened the fears of a community already on edge amid a historic push for more restrictions on trans people’s rights this year. Donald Trump Jr., the former president’s son, suggested the FBI and Justice Department monitor “violent factions within the trans community.” In Idaho, the head of the state Republican Party invoked the shooting as she called for the governor to sign legislation banning gender affirming medical care for minors. The disinformation surrounding the shooting doesn’t surprise Imara Jones, a transgender woman and creator of “The Anti-Trans Hate Machine,” a podcast that focuses on the spread of disinformation about transgender people. “That’s what the disinformation is doing.” Several hundred bills restricting transgender people’s rights have been introduced in statehouses this year, including a resurgence of bathroom bills and bans on gender affirming care for minors. “Extremist politicians and pundits are focusing on speculations about the shooter and fear-mongering about transgender people because they have no interest or willpower to offer real commonsense solutions to America’s gun problem,” Jay Brown, the Human Rights Campaign’s senior vice president for programs, research and training, said in a statement.