Editorial: Johnson must condemn GOP anti-trans rhetoric

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) has a knack for wiggling out of situations. During the recent government shutdown, he used a variety of excuses for why he kept postponing swearing-in Congressmember Adelita Grijalva (D-Arizona). He would often use the phrase, “I haven’t heard about it,” when responding to reporters on various issues, when, of course, he most certainly did know about what he was being asked.

Grijalva had to wait 50 days to take her oath of office all because she was the 218th vote on a discharge petition to release the Epstein files. After the House and Senate overwhelmingly approved that petition, President Donald Trump reversed course, signed the bill, and now the country waits to see what, exactly, will be released.

Johnson is also known for his transphobia, and willingly goes along with Republican congressmembers who seek to bully and misgender the one out trans lawmaker, Congressmember Sarah McBride (D-Delaware), as well as paint all trans people as a risk to this country. Before McBride was even sworn into office, Congressmember Nancy Mace (R-South Carolina) last November introduced a bill banning trans women from using women’s restrooms in House office buildings. It was Johnson who then informally implemented the policy.

Last month, many House Democrats had had enough. In a letter to Johnson signed by 213 of them, they took the speaker to task, urging him to “strongly condemn the rise in anti-trans rhetoric, including from members of Congress, and to urge you to ensure members of Congress are following rules of decorum and not using their platforms to demonize and scapegoat any marginalized community, including the transgender community.”

The letter painted a stark picture of a House of Representatives that has been dysfunctional this year. Republicans control the chamber yet have abdicated their oversight responsibility to curry favor with Trump and insulate themselves from his name-calling and threats to primary them in next year’s midterm elections. It is the House that controls the federal government’s purse strings, but you wouldn’t know it because the Republicans have willingly gone along with all of Trump’s initiatives, from gutting USAID funding to a massive budget increase for Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents’ raids to clawing back funds Congress had already allocated.

But it is the transphobia present in the Republican Caucus that has reached a breaking point for Democrats.

In their letter, Democratic House members called attention to the legislative attacks on the trans community that have occurred. “We have also heard calls by members of Congress to institutionalize all transgender people, comments referring to transgender people as mentally ill, and false suggestions by high-level political figures that transgender people are inherently violent and must be addressed as a national security threat,” the letter stated. “This language, coupled with the rising number of legislative and administrative attacks we have seen against the transgender community, is taking a real toll on the transgender community with many members fearing for their safety.”

The letter goes on to cite the latest federal hate crime statistics for 2024 that show a reported 463 hate crime incidents motivated by gender identity bias. This, of course, is likely an undercount because many law enforcement agencies don’t report hate crimes or report zero hate crimes to the FBI, the congressmembers wrote.

Congressmember Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) was one of the signatories, along with all 12 of the out LGBTQ congressmembers: McBride; Mark Pocan (Wisconsin); Mark Takano and Robert Garcia of California; Sharice Davids (Kansas); Angie Craig (Minnesota); Chris Pappas (New Hampshire); Becca Balint (Vermont); Emily Randall (Washington); Eric Sorensen (Illinois); Ritchie Torres (New York), and Julie Johnson (Texas). The letter was led by the Congressional Equality Caucus, which Takano chairs and McBride co-chairs.

In a news release, Pelosi, herself a former House speaker, pointed out that the signers represent the diversity of the Democratic Caucus. It should be noted that when Pelosi was speaker – from 2007-2011 and again from 2019-2013 – we didn’t see this kind of immature behavior coming from Democratic members. And while there were plenty of policy disagreements, members didn’t wage verbal attacks against entire groups of people. As speaker, Pelosi kept her caucus in line, producing signature legislative achievements like passage of the Affordable Care Act and the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” How times have changed.

It's clear that many Republican congressmembers don’t seem to care about governing at all. Johnson certainly doesn’t. He put Congress on recess during the entirety of the government shutdown, while the U.S. Senate continued to try and solve the impasse. It could be argued that having the House out on recess prolonged the shutdown because members weren’t in town to negotiate or vote.

Johnson, as the leader of Congress, owes it to the American people to take action against members who denigrate other people, whether it be trans people, immigrants, or other minorities. His acquiescence to members’ overt transphobia is greatly adding to the polarization in this country. The House of Representatives has rules on decorum that Johnson is not enforcing. If he did, this country might actually see civil discourse on these issues. At the very least, he should put into practice the Christian piety he publicly displays and professes. 

We know that politics is not for the faint of heart. But it is frustrating to see week after week the anti-trans animus that spews forth from Washington, D.C. Much of that is because Johnson lacks the capacity to lead; instead, he seems to treat the whole governing enterprise as one big joke. It’s time for that to end. Democrats have proved in the off-year elections this year that they can win, and next year may be a rude awakening for Johnson and his fellow Republicans.