March 7, 2025 • 48 mins
On this episode of The Middle we look at the ongoing battle over Trans rights, especially as the Trump administration continues to scale back on LGBTQ protections. Jeremy is joined by Iowa State Representative Aime Wichtendahl and New York Times Reporter Amy Harmon. The Middle's house DJ Tolliver joins as well, plus callers from around the country. #trans #lgbtq #Trump #military #schools #prisons #genderaffirmingcare #civilrights
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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Speaker 2 (00:09):
And news organizations.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
More information on how you can support the Middle at
listen to Themiddle dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
I'm Jeremy Hobson along with our house DJ Tolliver and
Tolliver We've been very busy here. We were gonna take
last week off. Instead we ended up putting out four shows.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
You gotta do what you gotta do to four it
eggs these days, man like, well, you know, four shows.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
That's true.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
And one of those shows was in collaboration with the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It was live across the US and Canada.
I actually should have brought some eggs back from Vancouver
because they're actually still.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Cheap up there.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
But another was our new weekly podcast extra called One
Thing Trump Did, in which we are doing a deep
dive into one thing Trump has done each week. It
is available in the Middle podcast feed in partnership with
iHeart Podcasts on the iHeart app or wherever you listen
to podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
So this hour we are.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Taking on the battle over transgender rights. About one point
six percent of the US population identifies as transgender or
non binary, but that population has gotten a lot of
negative attention from President Trump, including in his inaugural address.
Speaker 4 (01:19):
As of today, it will henceforth be the official policy
of the United States government that there are only two genders,
male and female.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
The president has also targeted trans athletes, said trans women
must be in men's prisons, and he banned trans service
members from the military. Here's Navy Commander Emily Shilling, who
is transgender, speaking with CNN about that ban.
Speaker 5 (01:46):
I have dedicated nineteen and a half years of service.
Was my dream to join and fly for the Navy
since I was little. I did two tours in Iraq
and Afghanistan, sixty combat missions later, I went on to
be a test pilot and then the meritorious promotions. I
have been at the pinnacle of naval aviation. I think
I'm proof standing here that you know we are qualified
to serve.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So how do you feel about all this and what's
the way forward that respects freedom and equality for all Americans.
That's what we're asking this hour. Tolliver, can you give
everyone the number please?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Yeah, it's eight four four four Middle. That's eight four
four four sixty four three three five three, or you
can write to us at Listen to the Middle dot com.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
And because of the sensitivity of this topic, let me
just remind you we want to be civil and respectful
as we have this conversation. Let's meet our panel. Iowa
State Representative Amy Wickendal joins us, the first openly trans
elected official in that state. Representative Wickendal, great to have
you on the show.
Speaker 6 (02:38):
That's my pleasure to be here. Jeremy, thank you so
much for inviting me.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
And Amy Harmon joins us as well. She covers gender
issues for The New York Times. Amy, Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 7 (02:47):
Thanks thanks for having me.
Speaker 8 (02:48):
Good to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
So before we go to the phones, Amy Harmon, let's
define our terms here because this is new to many Americans. Transgender,
non binary, and intersects. Those are all different things. What
does each mean?
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Just briefly?
Speaker 7 (03:01):
Maybe it starts. It helps to start by saying that
gender identity, which is also a concept that is mentioned
in the Trump executive orders, is how people think of
themselves in terms of being male, female, or something else.
So people who are who are transgender are people who
have a gender identity that is different from the sex
they were identified as at birth that was entered on
(03:23):
their original birth certificate. People who are non binary have
a gender identity that is not exclusively male or female,
or who prefer to just refuse the categories. And people
who are intersex are born with sexual characteristics that don't
fit a typical male or female pattern, and they can
be one of their several dozen known variations in chromosomes,
(03:46):
go and ads, genitals, or hormones.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
And why have they been lumped together by President Trump
in the sense that when he says there are only
two genders, it of course affects all of these people,
all of these groups.
Speaker 7 (03:57):
Part of what he's trying to say is that there's
he doesn't like the idea that gender identity can be
substituted for sex. He's trying to make a distinction between
how people think of themselves in terms of being male,
female or something else, and you know, the characteristics that
they're that they're that they're born with. And so yeah,
I mean, I think that he's really trying to talk
(04:19):
about people who are trans, who have transgender identities and
and say that that that's kind of not something that
the government is going to recognize.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Representative Wikendalt, what is it like for you and other
transgender Americans to be not just the focus of so
much political attention right now, but to have your rights
and even your very identity questioned all the way up
to the President of the United States.
Speaker 6 (04:43):
I mean, it's deeply frustrating and deeply disheartening. I mean, certainly,
this country has a lot of unique problems that it
needs to solve, none of which are solved by targeting
transgender people. The reality of the situation is this is
just pure based politics. It's dehumanizing politics. And I've always
said the oldest trick in politics is to say, look
(05:03):
over there, surely you don't want those people looking living
in your community. Surely you don't think those people over
there should have rights while while they're picking your pocket.
And that's what we're seeing. They're using it as a
distraction while they you know, fire federal workers, you know,
and just basically gut the government for their own benefit.
So that's why they're attacking us, is because we're a small,
(05:24):
very small percentage of the US population that's susceptible to it.
But they're you know, dismantling the government and basically fleecing
it for themselves because they can, and that's what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
As we said, you are the first trans elected official
in the state of Iowa. But your state was just
in the news because your colleagues in the legislature just
voted and then the governor Republican signed a law removing
transgender protections from state civil rights laws.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
What does that mean for you?
Speaker 6 (05:52):
I mean, it's the most frustrating thing. And the thing
that I said, you know, kind of on my floor
speech last week is like, I remember when this bill
was signed into law back in two thousand and seven,
and it was done.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
By providing protections, providing civil rights protections.
Speaker 6 (06:05):
Providing writing gender identity into the IYOW with Civil Rights
Act to protect you know, against discrimination and housing, employment,
access to credit education. All of those things were done
bi partisan lee in two thousand and seven and had
remained in state law for the better part of two decades.
The reality of the situation is is that you have
a very you know, vocal part, very vocal, but minority
(06:30):
part of the Republican Party who does not want people
like me to exist, and they will weaponize the law
to move sure that happens, and this is just one step.
And my representative Steve Whole basically said the quiet part
out loud. He's like, we need to go ahead and
do this because our bills keep getting blocked as being unconstitutional,
so we need to repeal this so we can continue
to do unconstitutional things to islands, to transgender islands.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Amy Harmon as a reporter. When you look at the
polling right now, I saw you gov poll from last year,
the found that depending on the issue, it's very different
how American people feel about this. Overall, that there's actually
broad support for civil rights protections for trans people, but
there's also broad opposition to for example, trans athletes playing
(07:15):
in women's sports. Do you have Can you make any
sense of that of where people sort of in general
right now in twenty twenty five draw the line and
they say, Okay, I'm okay with this level of rights
for trans Americans, but not this level.
Speaker 7 (07:30):
Yeah, I mean I think that it's true. I think
if you ask people, it also kind of depends on
the question. But if you ask people, you know, if
they think that trans people should be discriminated against or
should have rights, they'll say they should not be discrimined
against and should you know, have equal rights. But there
is a real discomfort and it's really reflected in the
polls about trans athletes playing in women's sports. But we
(07:54):
had a poll the New York Times and IPSOS had
a poll that suggested that eighty percent of Americans do
not want trans athletes participating in women's sports. And then,
you know, and there's also there's a discomfort or there's
a you know about way it is appropriate for miners
to get access to gender transition treatments. So those like
(08:16):
those particular issues. You know, there's there's real sentiment among
Americans that you know, there's just there that that is
they're not comfortable with those things, you know, and that's
something that in talking to transgender rights advocates a lot
of I think there's been a lot of like realization
of that and and desire to try to reach out
(08:39):
and and to educate people, Like there's many Americans more
than half of Americans don't know a transgender person, don't
realize that they know a transgender person. So I think
that looking at some of those polls has has you know,
started a conversation maybe among trans rights advocates and to
(09:00):
to try to think about how to talk about conversations.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
And we're going to get into both of those big issues,
but representative with do you see people in your community
in Iowa gradually becoming more accepting of trans people over
time or do you think that there's a backlash going
on right now in this current political moment.
Speaker 6 (09:16):
I think it's an astroturfed movement because I think you
have people with a lot of money who have nothing
better to do than to ruin people's lives. When you
bring up sports, for example, you know how many trans
athletes were the entire state of Iowa. About two So
they went out and wrote a law to ban two
trans girls from playing sports. Let's be real, this is
(09:38):
not a ubiquitous thing. This is very much targetting a
small group, a minority group. And these these these kids
weren't after elite scholarships, they weren't actively displacing female athletes.
They wanted to be part of a team in play
sports with their friends. That's the part that's getting overridden
when they do this because they use in Cndiari language,
they use dehumanizing language when they phrase this to the
(10:02):
to the American people, and it's you know, it's not
an honest conversation. It's a very one sided, very loud
conversation coming from the people who don't want us to exist.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
What do you say though, to people who maybe are
are one of the two thirds of Americans who don't
know a trans person right now and think that when
they do engage in this conversation, they're worried that they're
going to sound bigoted if they say the wrong thing.
Speaker 6 (10:27):
Well, my whole thing is like, listen, if you if
you come at this with a place of honesty and
open mindedness and want to have a legitimate conversation, then
by all means, let's have this conversation. But the thing
that always frustrates me is people arrive at answers and
then want to go ahead and talk about it and
explain why their opinion is right, where there's usually not
good faith dialogue to be had with with you know,
(10:51):
organizations that are kind of pushing these narratives like I
will absolutely one hundred percent sit down and anyone who
has good faith questions and talk about it. But like
when we're already arriving at the answer, then there's not
a conversation that we.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Had well, toll of our trans issues did play a
very big role in the presidential campaign.
Speaker 5 (11:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
President Trump's campaign spent hundreds of millions of dollars airing
ads like this one about Kamala Harris's stance on trans issues.
Speaker 9 (11:18):
Kamala support taxpayer funded sex changes for.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Prisoners, surgery for prisoners, for prisoners, every transgender inmate in
the prison system would have access.
Speaker 4 (11:29):
No, no, I don't want my taxpayer dollars going to
Kamala supports transgender sex changes in jail with our money.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
Kamala even supports letting biological men compete against our girls
in their sports.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Kamala is for day dim.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
President Trump is for you.
Speaker 10 (11:44):
I'm Donald J.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Trump, and I approved this message and we're going to
get to the politics of that in just a moment.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
On the Middle, This is the middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
If you're just tuning in the Middle as a national
call in show, we're focused on elevating voices from the middle, geographic, politically, philosophically.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Or maybe you just want to meet in the middle.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
This hour, we're talking about the current battle over trans
rights in America.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Tolliver, what is the number to call in it's eight.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
Four four for Middle that's eight four four four six
four three three five three. You can also write to
us that listen to the Middle dot com or on
social media.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
I'm joined by Iowa State Representative Amy Wickendahal and New
York Times reporter Amy Harmon. And before we get to
the phones and they are lighting up, Amy Harmon, what
about the politics of this? How important was that ad
that we just heard in Donald Trump's victory?
Speaker 7 (12:29):
Do you think It's hard to know how important it was.
But one thing that is true is that if you
watch TV during the campaign, you almost certainly saw that ad.
It was very widely aired. And so many Democrats believe
that that that strategy, that ad in particular, helped helped
(12:49):
push Trump over the edge. And so they're looking at
this issue and they're thinking this is like, this is
a hard issue for the Democrats.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
Representative Wickndahal, what do you think?
Speaker 1 (12:59):
And I I should point out that at least twenty
six states have now banned gender affirming care for minors, which,
according to the polls, many Americans think is a good thing.
Speaker 6 (13:11):
Well, they asked two questions there, So first one in
terms of how much it played victory. I don't think
it played as victor big as victory as they think.
They think that they spent two hundred million dollars and
it was not even in the top like five or
ten percent of issues that Americans identified. Americans identified a
bad economy is why they voted Trump into office. They
wanted somebody to fix what they felt was like being
(13:34):
left behind. They wanted a disrupt her the system, and
they wanted somebody to you know, help bring you know,
basically recover post inflation. That's what they wanted. That's currently
not what they're getting. Secondly, in terms of gender banning
gender affirming care, you realize this causes people to end
their lives when they are denied gender affirming care for minors.
(13:55):
You realize that right because I the transgender teenagers. I
always once a transgender kid. I did not transition until
I was twenty five, and I nearly committed suicide. I
nearly stepped in front of a train. So people who
are denied this care, the results can be devastating because
they don't have access to life saving care. I've talked
(14:16):
to you know, definitely numbers of families who have kids
who have been able to transition. And the one thing
that they always say is that after my child was
able to go ahead and transition, I saw the light
come on in their eyes. They were happier, They're able
to do the things life is worth living. And that
is what you're denying these kids the ability to have
(14:37):
a good life, and just to handwave away the fact
that they're you know that they don't care. If they
would rather have a dead kid than a trans kid.
That is what the authors of these bills would rather have.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Point very good points.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
I just want to ask you because this is the
other argument that is made against that, which is what
about what if they decide later that they wish that
they had not done that, and they've already done things
to themselves that are irreversible.
Speaker 6 (15:05):
The rate of regret is less than five percent. There
is no other medical treatment that you can get that
has such a low regret rate. Now, when you have doctors,
they can customize the plan for the individual, and a
lot of times the doctors who do go ahead and
provide this really do have not necessarily level of resistance.
But like there is a path, you can't just go
in and get hormones tomorrow. It is a path you
(15:27):
have to go through psychologists, psychiatrists, you have to be
seen with an endro chronologist, and they really do kind
of step what the path is. So like I said,
you know, they talk about regret, they talk about regret,
but the Brinlla fact is it's greater than ninety five
percent success rate, and you can't look at any other
medical treatment to see that kind of level of success rate.
(15:49):
So again it's one of those things that's missing the
forest for the trees. And again it's usually waiving that
those small number of people who had regrets over it
to completely erase the hundreds of people who had success
and found happiness with it.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
Let's go to the phones.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Alex is calling from Colorado. Alex, welcome to the middle.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Go ahead.
Speaker 11 (16:09):
I'm a computer engineer. I've been one for fifteen years,
and trans women are very much overrepresented in my industry
compared to this that's elsewhere. If you make being trans
intolerable enough in this country, you're going to see a
brain drain of the best compiler engineers. Everyone who knows Russ,
(16:29):
everyone who knows Haskel, They're all going to go to
Berlin and become you know, DJs or whatever, like, just
leaving aside the inhumanity of the cruelty of it all,
just tactically, it makes no gosh harn sense to send
all these very smart people pagging.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Interesting an economic effect, you see, Alex, Thank you for
that call, Amy Harmon. It brings up an issue, I guess,
which is, how is this playing out in corporate America?
As you've been reporting, Are these issues about trans rights
and trans acceptance uh being seen across companies and organizations.
Speaker 7 (17:10):
In terms of discrimination against trans people? They're They're definitely there.
We did have a story one of my clouds today,
I think about the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission dropping. So
under the under the Biden administration, there had been several
cases brought against employers for discrimination on the basis of
gender identity, and now the Trump administration is sort of
(17:34):
reversing force on that and in fact saying that employers
who you know, require who like, require a pronoun that
people to be called according to the pronounce of their
gender identity and use restrooms or locker rooms according to
their gender identity, you know, might be uh prosecuted for
(17:55):
for for sex discrimination. So there's been a real reversal
on that under this administration.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
Mia is calling from southeast Michigan. Mia, Welcome to the
middle your thoughts as we talk about trans rights in America.
Speaker 12 (18:10):
Hi, thanks for having me on. I'm a trans person
myself and I started transition twelve years ago, which I
have definitely noticed a big change in the tenor of
the conversation. And with respect to your guests, I vehemently
disagree with your guests from Iowa. You know, I feel
(18:32):
that I've personally been hurt by the backlash that has
been brewing. And I think a big part of the
backlash is that posturing of you know, other people just
want to ruin our lives other people. You know, there's
a very low regret rate all this, which the truth
(18:52):
of the matter is there isn't really any good evidence
either way. And as someone who's done this for twelve years,
like I wouldn't say that I necessarily regret things. But
I also, looking back with the wisdom of an adult,
I realized that maybe it wasn't totally necessary, maybe other
(19:13):
things could have happened that you know, it wasn't a
foregone conclusion that if I didn't do this thing, I
was going.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
To kill myself. So but you are you saying you
regret transitioning.
Speaker 12 (19:25):
I no, I don't regret it necessarily, but I'm not
entirely sure it's it was fully necessary. Which is sort
of the line that's always portrayed. Is it's the example
I give is it's like if you have a sprained ankle,
you don't automatically jump to surgery for a sprain ankle,
right like, you wrap it and you give rest and
(19:46):
you take advil and whatever. And I think that currently
there's really the idea that, well, surgery is the only option,
you know, we have to jump to. This is our
first line treatment.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
What do you think?
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Let me just finally ask you, MEO, what do you
think though of the sort of what President Trump has
been doing, uh and the saying that that there are
only two genders in America and that trans people can't
serve in the military.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
Et cetera.
Speaker 12 (20:13):
I mean, you know, I just renewed my passport and
I'm waiting to see, you know, what happens when I
get it back. So I'm not glad about it. But
at the same time, I have interacted with many people
who did vote for President Trump, and I have found
that as a whole, they're generally more open minded than
you expect. So I am, I am upset at President Trump,
(20:38):
but also I'm cautiously optimistic about the American people in
the long term.
Speaker 9 (20:46):
So yeah, I hope that answers your question.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yeah, amah, thank you very much. Representative Wikandal, I'll let
you respond there. I'm sure that you know there is
a diversity of opinion that you've heard, even among trans
people about about this.
Speaker 6 (20:58):
I mean, certainly there is. The one thing that I
will say is that when it comes down to this
like it, there's two things. Like I said, it didn't
start and end with sports. Governor Reynolds when she posted
this bill started with sports, moved on to gender affirm
and care and now as fully repealed civil rights protections.
(21:18):
So they and keep in mind, we existed in the
state with these protections for the better part of a
decade and a half, just minding our own business. And
the only real reason why this came up is because
Governor Reynolds wanted to make her career national She went
on Fox News to go ahead, and because it was
all the rage in twenty twenty one and twenty twenty
(21:39):
two to go ahead, and you know she was trying
to follow DeSantis's lead. Then she basically just threw everyone
for a loop and said no, I want a transports band.
And then but it didn't stop there. The next thing
that happened. She's wanting to then gender affirm and care
firm and secondly kind of on that. Nobody is saying
surgery is the first result. As I alluded to, it
is a process, and you could people who go through
(22:02):
gender transition kind of determine where that process ends. What
is cruel is the ability to ban that care, to
deny that care, to basically over like because we heard
a lot here in Iowa about parental rights, and the
people who are preaching parental rights the loudest were the
first ones to take it away from other people, and
(22:23):
so they denied their family the right to have access
to healthcare. I firmly believe that, like you should always
find the path that's right to you. I can tell
you my story and where it ended up with not
having gender affirming care, with not having to be the
ability to be out. It almost killed me. Is that
the same for everybody? No, certainly not. But like I
don't believe the government is the one that should be
(22:44):
standing in front of people's ways and their life choices
with respect to their health care.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
There's a lot of comments coming in on Laeah, go ahead.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
I'll do my question next time.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
No, right, do your question. Do your question.
Speaker 13 (22:57):
Let's do it.
Speaker 3 (22:57):
Okay, So Amy had a good question. So our last
call talked about gender markers on passports. I know, once
President Trump took off as a lot of my friends
were worried about that. I'm just wondering, like, politically, what
is sort of the end game do you foresee for
President Trump? Like how much can he do? How much
damage can he do to the transgender community? I guess
is where I'm asking.
Speaker 6 (23:17):
I mean, the goal is, like I said, too, go ahead,
and I mean with respect to incorrect gender markers, is
I mean, there are very real harms that can be
done you putting someone's incorrect gender marker on their either passport,
driver's license, whatever it may be. You know, whenever you
either interact with somebody from the government or you need
to show your ID, one of a couple of things
(23:38):
may happen. I mean, first, you inadvertently out yourself, you know,
because your gender marker doesn't match. Secondly, sometimes people will
think it's a fake ID, you know, in terms of
you know, what you're seeing in the photo doesn't match
what the markers that are on there, so you may
get further questions. And it's designed to further make interacting
(23:59):
in public life impossible.
Speaker 7 (24:02):
You know.
Speaker 6 (24:02):
The real the real like the real harm is like
when they try to like move like I said, I
think when they're looking at moving prisoners from who are
inmates on there, certainly it's a you know, there is
a violation of federal law that's happening there. I think
it's something to will maybe blank on the name. It's
something like Prevent Rape in Prison Act pre I think
is the name of it. But the question I you know,
(24:25):
then they're like, well, we're moving trans women into men's prison.
Can you imagine what someone who looks like me, what
would happen in a men's prison? Because I would like
you to imagine that horrible situation for a moment, because
that is very much what they're trying to do, and yes,
it will cause very real harm.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Let's go back to the phones in Colin and by
the way, Tulliver, you have to say which amy you're
talking to because both of our guests are named Amy.
Speaker 7 (24:52):
Actually, can I just say that, just in response to
Tulliver's question, that you know, there are a lot of
in terms, I mean, your question was, you know, how
far can Trump go in in uh? And there are
a lot of lawsuits challenging the executive orders that he's
issued on these uh, these issues. We have we I mean,
(25:16):
more broadly, we have a spreadsheet that's following I think
one hundred lawsuits not about you know about against the
Trump administration relating to all the executive orders, but I
am following about twelve specifically related to the trans issues.
So you know, for example, the other Amy mentioned moving
prisoners moving trans women from women's facilities into men's facilities.
(25:39):
That's been blocked by by a district court judge. And
so is the withholding of tender related treatments from those
prisoners for now, that's on hold. The uh uh there's
a a hearing next week on the trans military ban
that's temporarily on hold. The the withholding of federal funds
(26:03):
to hospitals that provide gender transition treatments for minors up
to age nineteen. It's also been put on hold by
a federal judge. So there's been you know, there's been
legal roadblocks put in place that are temporary. But so
we'll see where that goes. But that's that's what's happening now.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Yeah, Colin is calling from Philadelphia. Colin, Welcome to the
Middle Go ahead.
Speaker 14 (26:27):
Thanks. Yeah, I love your show. I really feel like
the you know, like this is such a new issue,
and I feel like the culture is playing a lot
of catch up, and I think it's really important to
look at other cultures that have been accepting of these
(26:48):
this kind of the people who are in this community,
you know, looking at Native American two spirits in Thailand,
Lady boy. I mean, there's there's this tradition around the
world of creating a space outside of gender really and
creating a third gender or a third space outside of
(27:11):
sex really that I think is really important from a
spiritual perspective to have a level of respect for the
community on a on a level that's more that's deeper
than any kind of like physical trait. And I think
looking into that tradition and looking at the you know,
(27:35):
the way that people in other cultures respect people in
a spiritual sense is so important and and not I
feel like the the politicization and especially around use of
pronouns in in kind of a way that is that
is kind of a kind of a virtue signal or
or a you know, demand that we that we kind
(27:59):
of make of peace people. I don't think that's I
think that's been a not a very helpful way of
relating to people on a very un emotional and spiritual
kind of way.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Yeah, Colin, thank you very much for that, Amy Wikendall.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
I did see today on the issue of the pronouns
that people put that Governor Greg Abbott in Texas fired
somebody who didn't take the pronouns.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
Off of the signature who worked for the state.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Just briefly, your your your thoughts on the on the signatures,
on the on the pronouns.
Speaker 6 (28:32):
So I'd like to say say that phrase back. You
fired somebody because they put their pronouns in their femail. Really,
you took somebody's job, career, life, hope and dreams and
fired them for that.
Speaker 13 (28:44):
Really.
Speaker 6 (28:45):
Yeah, Really, that's where we're at as a country. You're
firing some because there are like legitimate reasons to have
those because you don't necessarily know based on name alone,
if the person you're speaking to is male or female,
or other or identifies as other. Like if you have
jen neutral names, or even a name that may be
is traditionally assigned to one gender, but may the person
(29:05):
may be a member of the opposite gender. When you're
not interacting with that person in a visual or auditory sense,
having pronouns may make sense to understand who you were
in fact speaking to. It doesn't necessarily mean you're talking
to someone who is identifying as transgender. But I think
it's absolutely ridiculous that you would destroy someone's career because
they put their pronouns in their emails signature. It's ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Well, stand by right there, you know, Tolliver.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
The liberal Democratic governor of California, Gavin Newsom, just came
out against trans athletes in girls sports. This is one
area that has attracted a lot of controversy.
Speaker 3 (29:38):
Yeah, some athletes, you know, express support for transgender athletes,
while others have not. Here's former collegiate swimmer Riley Gains
speaking against the inclusion of trans athletes just last year.
Speaker 15 (29:48):
The unfair competition that we faced, the locker room, the
silencing we face from our universities, and then the bigger
picture of why this matters and what's ultimately at stake.
If we don't have pe willing to defend women's spaces
and defend the truth.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
That is a very big part of this conversation. We're
going to be back with more of your calls on
the Middle in a moment.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
This is the Middle.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
I'm Jeremy Hobson. In this hour, we're talking about the
battle over trans rights in America. You can call us
at eight four four four Middle. That's eight four four
four six four three three five three. You can also
reach out to us at listen tooth Middle dot com.
My guests are New York Times reporter Amy Harmon and
Iowa State Representative Amy Wickendahl. And let's go to the
phones because they are lighting up. Tara is calling from Colorado.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Tara, Welcome to the Middle. Go ahead with your thoughts thoughts.
Speaker 8 (30:40):
Hi, thanks so much for taking my call and for
hosting a show on this topic. I'm a parent of
a transgender teenager and we've been on a learning journey
with our child for about the last eight years, and
I just one of the things that really troubles me
about the way this issue is being framed in the
(31:02):
national dialogue and in policies such as banning transgender service
members from the military, is it's being framed as an
issue of being fraudulent. We're dishonest, and I just want
to share our experience. I know is consistent with many
other families and transgender people that as I've observed my
child when they were starting at about five or six
(31:25):
years old, there was a distress going on that we
couldn't really identify for a while. And as we continue
to just listen to our child and consult with consult
with mental health professionals and others, we realized that our
child was dealing with a deep sense of discord in
(31:46):
their in their being. And as we started to go
listen to them and they said, hey, I want to
wear these clothes instead of these clothes, I want to
Can we cut my hair this way instead of this way,
what we saw was our child become the discord lift,
the kind of the dark cloud lifted, and there was
this there was this kind of life that came into them,
and we've just continued to follow their lead. There's in
(32:08):
no way that we've ever pushed or suggested or you know,
or led our child. We've really just been following their
lead and consultation with with people who really are working
with the evidence. And I want to say that what
I know about what it means how our bodies and
our psyches are when we're truthful, is you know, we're
(32:29):
in better health. We are able to function in the world,
We're able to participate in careers and schools, and you know,
when we're truthful, there's evidence that that our that our
health is better and our outlook and everything is better.
And that's what I see with my child when they're
affirmed in the way they want to express their gender,
their their mental health and everything and their performance in
(32:49):
the world is consistent with truthfulness and integrity. And so
I see as we've been able to affirm their gender
as they've grown up, they've and they they've been able
to seek gender firm and care from their pediatrician so
they didn't have to go through a puberty that was
causing them to scream on the floor, right, And like
we're able to get some life saving medication for them
(33:12):
that allows them to become a straight a student in school,
maintain a job, have a relationship, have a future vision
for themselves. And the last thing I'll say is that
as a parent, I want to be able to say
to my child, if you work hard in this country,
you can be anything you want to be. And I
can't currently say that to my transgender child because I
(33:33):
know that career in military is currently being cut off
to them, possibly travel is being cut off to them.
The entire country has shrunk by about fifty percent for
my child to just be able to move freely and
be in public spaces, and that's not something any parent
wants to have to talk.
Speaker 11 (33:49):
With or chappen about.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
Tarah, thank you very much for that call. Amy Harmon,
I'll just go to you.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
I'm sure you've spoken to many parents of trans kids
and trans teens. What do you think of that and
just the idea of truthfulness versus you know, perhaps some
who are who are coming against trans Americans saying that
they're not being honest about what's going on.
Speaker 7 (34:11):
Yeah, I think I'm glad. I'm glad to have that color.
I think expressed a lot of sentiment that is, you know,
widely widely echoed among the parents of trans youth that
I've talked to, and I've talked to people you know,
certainly in recent weeks who are really trying to figure
out what to do, worried about their children, not you know,
(34:33):
their hospital's canceling appointments for gender reforming care. Some of
them are thinking of leaving the country. So yeah, so,
I mean, I think that is an experience that's that
a lot of people are having now. And I do
think that this issue of what is the truth is
(34:55):
fundamental to what's going on here, and and there's I
mean so, but I will also say that when I
talk to you know, social conservatives, people who are you know,
skeptical of of of trans participation in public life, which
is kind of what we're we're talking about here, there's
this sense of that, you know, that there are these
(35:15):
fundamental biological differences between men and women, and that is
feeling like people are not acknowledging that, and they wanted
to be acknowledged. And that's kind of you know, for
people who are I'm talking to who are happy about
these executive orders, that's what they are saying. They're saying,
you know, finally we're seeing, we're seeing like reality acknowledged
(35:38):
that that you know, we want to be able to
express this biological differences without being labeled you know, called
a bigot or so, you know, I I do think
there's this disconnect between like what Tara is talking about,
that is that is obviously very real, what what our
child is going through and what our child feels and
(35:59):
so you know, trans people are real, they exist. So
but there's some inability I think to really connect on
on this issue of, you know, what is biological biological sex.
I think like I'm working on a story now where
I'm trying to get biologists and legal scholars and trans
(36:21):
advocates and you know, politicians to like talk to me
about how they define sex biology and it's it's it's hard.
Speaker 6 (36:30):
It's hard.
Speaker 7 (36:30):
So he's already even among biologists. So you know, I
think that is a conversation that we need to start having.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
H And let's get to more of our conversation with Aaron,
who's calling from Jackson, Michigan.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Aaron, Welcome to the middle.
Speaker 9 (36:43):
Go ahead, Hey, hi, thanks for taking me on. So,
as a lifelong conservative and a never trumper, and my
girlfriend has a friend she's known for thirty years who
has recently transitioned, and for her to be told that
she doesn't know the woman experience has been kind of infuriating,
not necessarily for me, for my girlfriend obviously, but if
(37:05):
they were less vocal about it and you just blend in,
you can learn people will see you as a person,
no longer as an identity or as a title, and
they will not be threatened by that. And it's just
something that I feel that Trump has been able to
use against the community. And I am so against these
people being singled out and being enraged, you know, or
(37:28):
having bigots enraged at who they are when all they
are is good people. But by having a subset of
the community take it over and say look at me,
look at me, look at me, the squeaky wheel gets
a grease, and in this case, it's not a good
type of grease to get. And I just feel that
if we talked about that more and we were able
to make them people instead of a thing, we would
(37:49):
have less of these problems.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
But you're saying, in part that's because trans people, you feel,
are being too vocal about being trans.
Speaker 9 (37:57):
Some right, not all of them obviously. So again, in
this one instance, I know a couple of trans people,
but my girlfriend is being told by her friend who
recently transitioned to female, you don't understand the woman experience.
That was just that was shocking to me.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
Aaron, I thank you for calling in, and I'm going
to go to Representative Wickandahal. What do you think about
that what Aaron said, I'm trying to.
Speaker 6 (38:23):
Parse it a little bit, but I mean in terms
of like we in some cases have to be vocal
because our lives are on the line. Like you know,
like I said, I'll connect go back to it. Like
I said, we had the Civil Rights Act in Iowa
for the better part of twenty years and we were
just people minding our business, just going about it. They
still came after us anyway. You know, all we were
(38:46):
doing is trying to go about our daily lives, going
to our jobs, spending time with her families. We weren't
bothering anybody. And you know national political trends, this just
became the hot button fad for people to punch down.
So I mean, we can stay quiet, they'll still come
after us.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
You know, well what do you think of like like
so for right now, we have the first trans member
of Congress, Sarah McBride, who is it seems specifically not
making that the issue that she talks about. She's like
I'm here to bring down costs for my constituents. What
do you think of that as a as a strategy
as sort of one of the most maybe the most
(39:27):
high profile trans politician out there right now.
Speaker 6 (39:30):
I mean, and she's doing the work, She's doing the
work that she ran to do in her constituents elected
to and she, yeah, probably keeps her head down and
is less vocal about it than a lot of people are.
And she's still attacked anyway. You know, from your Marjorie
Taylor Green's or your Nancy mace Is, they're the ones
who are out there trying to basically just make you know,
(39:54):
going to the bathroom of crime and just you know,
they're the ones that are there, that are that are
screaming a loud as she's there trying to work for constituents.
You know, I will say personally, like I ran for
both local office and state office, I didn't make my
identity part of the cornerstone of my campaign. My first
campaign slogan was stand with local businesses. And I had
(40:16):
to become far more vocal in defense of the trans
community because we were being attacked and as the first state,
first openly electric trans women both in local government and
now state government. That responsibility falls to me to speak
up for my community. But you know, for the better
part of like the earlier part of my political career,
(40:37):
I was the one who is out there like talking
about lowering taxes and property taxes and building multi family homes.
Those are the things that I focused on, and those
are a lot of the things that I love to
focus on. But this these issues, you know, regardless of
whether we're quiet or whether we're loud, they push these
issues regardless, They attack our community regardless.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
I am going to go to the next call, but
there's technical problem, So I'm going to ask Jason, our engineer,
to go to line seven and John who is joining us?
Speaker 2 (41:07):
John, Hello, welcome to the middle all.
Speaker 10 (41:10):
Right, awesome.
Speaker 7 (41:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 10 (41:12):
I come from a conservative background. I even voted for
Trump in twenty sixteen, but I learned pretty quickly that
he's not really worthy of the office. And I fear
for the transgender people and anybody else in the LBG community,
even though I have no real connection to any of them.
I feel like they have a right to live their
(41:33):
life anyway they want to, and for them to make
it essentially open season. The people that support Trump. Many
of them are bigoted, racist, and I don't think our
country should be encouraging that in any way. You know,
(41:53):
it's appalling to me the things that Trump says and does.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
John, thank you.
Speaker 1 (41:58):
I appreciate the call. And Amy Harmon. You know, it
makes me wonder about the as you as you've looked
at the support on the Republican side for some of
the things that Trump is doing on trans issues. Is
this something that is politically popular for when he attacks
trans people or or decides they're not going to be
allowed in the military and things like that.
Speaker 6 (42:19):
Well, I think.
Speaker 7 (42:20):
Something that that the other Amy said earlier, I you know,
I wanted to is true, which is that what what
Americans care about is when when they're asked to rank
what they actually care about in terms of issues, trans
issues is always on the bottom of the list. It's always,
you know, the economy, job solution, right, So so that
(42:41):
is that is that is true? So but it does
you know this, this issue does seem to resonate with
some portion of the Republican base, and and and it's
broader than that. I mean, it's you know, some centrist
Democrats also, you know, resonate resonate with this. So I
think that that's that's just a political reality, and that's
(43:02):
part of why, you know, we've seen five executive orders
focusing on trans issues when people are you know, maybe
two percent of the population right right.
Speaker 1 (43:12):
Brian's calling from Arlington, Massachusetts. Hi, Brian, welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 13 (43:17):
Hi there, thank you. It's my first time ever calling
into a show. So I'm a I'm a CIS male
in my fifties, father of four teens here in Arlington,
mass And what I don't understand is what I learned
from my grandfather is we're a melting pot. I've learned
this all my life. We're a melting pot of all
different shape, shapes and sizes. And I always told my
(43:39):
kids were cut from the same cloth. And I don't
know what I feel that Trump reaches for is fear,
fear of things that he doesn't understand or he doesn't know,
which could be many things, but it's xenophobia. He's people
(44:00):
I can say biggeted this out of the other but
they're fearful of what they don't understand, and he reaches
for that and he grabs for it. But the thing being,
why is this the first thing that he goes for.
Instead of trying to help where help is needed, he
is trying to take rights away from the people that
(44:22):
live in this country and were born in this country.
His big thing is illegal is coming great. But you
know something, it's why is this the big thing? These
are people who are taxpayers, who are fighting for this country,
(44:43):
and it's doing nothing but kneecapping the military, kneecapping or businesses.
What it's doing is it's throwing a hiccup into everything.
It's it's it's a monkey wrench into gears. Should have
never changed.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
Brian, I got to let you go there because we
just were running out of time here. But Representative Wichandahal,
I'll go to you. Why do you think Trump is
focusing on the trans community? And I let me bring
it to the question that we asked of the hour
to wrap it up here, what is the way forward?
How do we have this conversation and make sure that everybody,
(45:21):
every American can have equality and respect and rights.
Speaker 6 (45:26):
I mean it's a couple conversations, a couple questions to
answer your questions here real quick. I find it interesting,
like if we go back to when Trump first ran
in twenty sixteen. It was kind of interesting because it
reminded me I remember he kind of trolled Ted Cruz
because Ted Cruz was the one that was obsessed with
the trans community. But one thing that you know about
(45:48):
the president, he is a bit of a nurs He
is a narcissist, and he listens to the voices who
pay him homage and basically kisses. But the most that's
how you curry favor with Donald Trump, kid like. And
the far right, not necessarily the far right, but the
(46:08):
basically the dominionists, the Christian nationalists within the kind of
the right wing of this figured that out early and
that's kind of why they went all in for Trump.
And so now that they're in the inner circle, he
will do what they want because they're the ones, lack
for a better word, basically kissing up to him. And
you know, as far as the way forward, I mean,
(46:33):
I think we have to call it what it is.
I mean, at the end of the day, it is
very much, you know, like what it's an attack on
It's an attack on who we are as Americans. If
we're to be a free and open people, then we
have to realize that it is not okay to it
is an unacceptable to demonize part of the American population
(46:55):
to score political points. We have to make that unacceptable
and political discourse again. We have to call it what
it is.
Speaker 10 (47:04):
And I do believe.
Speaker 6 (47:08):
You know, it reminds me a little bit too of
you know, when we were still having the marriage equality
debate ten to fifteen years and you had like Fred
Phelps and his church always showing up being the most extreme.
And I think that this, the fact that they're going
so extreme, will further push basically, it'll help. At the
(47:31):
end of the day, we will further advance the cause
of equal rights in this country because we can see
what happens when we don't have them.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
That is Iowas State Representative Amy Wickendaalal. We've also been
speaking with New York Times reporter Amy Harmon. I want
to thank you both so much for a great conversation
this hour. Thanks and next week we're going to be
taking your questions on all things artificial intelligence, and you
can call in as always at eight four four four
Middle that's a four four four six four three through
five three. You can reach out at Listen to the
(48:00):
Middle dot com, where you can also sign up for
our free weekly newsletter, The Middle is brought to you
by Longkook Media, distributed by Illinois Public Media in Urbana, Illinois,
and produced by Harrison Patino, Danny, Alexander Samburmas, Does, John Barth, Anicadessler,
and Brandon Condritz. Our technical director is Jason Croft. I'm
Jeremy Hobson, and I will talk to you next week
The Middle is supported by Journalism Funding Partners, a nonprofit
organization striving to increase the sustainability of local journalism by
building connections between donors.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
And news organizations.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
More information on how you can support the Middle at
listen to Themiddle dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
I'm Jeremy Hobson along with our house DJ Tolliver and
Tolliver We've been very busy here. We were gonna take
last week off. Instead we ended up putting out four shows.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
You gotta do what you gotta do to four it
eggs these days, man like, well, you know, four shows.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
That's true.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
And one of those shows was in collaboration with the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It was live across the US and Canada.
I actually should have brought some eggs back from Vancouver
because they're actually still.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Cheap up there.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
But another was our new weekly podcast extra called One
Thing Trump Did, in which we are doing a deep
dive into one thing Trump has done each week. It
is available in the Middle podcast feed in partnership with
iHeart Podcasts on the iHeart app or wherever you listen
to podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
So this hour we are.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Taking on the battle over transgender rights. About one point
six percent of the US population identifies as transgender or
non binary, but that population has gotten a lot of
negative attention from President Trump, including in his inaugural address.
Speaker 4 (01:19):
As of today, it will henceforth be the official policy
of the United States government that there are only two genders,
male and female.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
The president has also targeted trans athletes, said trans women
must be in men's prisons, and he banned trans service
members from the military. Here's Navy Commander Emily Shilling, who
is transgender, speaking with CNN about that ban.
Speaker 5 (01:46):
I have dedicated nineteen and a half years of service.
Was my dream to join and fly for the Navy
since I was little. I did two tours in Iraq
and Afghanistan, sixty combat missions later, I went on to
be a test pilot and then the meritorious promotions. I
have been at the pinnacle of naval aviation. I think
I'm proof standing here that you know we are qualified
to serve.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So how do you feel about all this and what's
the way forward that respects freedom and equality for all Americans.
That's what we're asking this hour. Tolliver, can you give
everyone the number please?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Yeah, it's eight four four four Middle. That's eight four
four four sixty four three three five three, or you
can write to us at Listen to the Middle dot com.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
And because of the sensitivity of this topic, let me
just remind you we want to be civil and respectful
as we have this conversation. Let's meet our panel. Iowa
State Representative Amy Wickendal joins us, the first openly trans
elected official in that state. Representative Wickendal, great to have
you on the show.
Speaker 6 (02:38):
That's my pleasure to be here. Jeremy, thank you so
much for inviting me.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
And Amy Harmon joins us as well. She covers gender
issues for The New York Times. Amy, Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 7 (02:47):
Thanks thanks for having me.
Speaker 8 (02:48):
Good to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
So before we go to the phones, Amy Harmon, let's
define our terms here because this is new to many Americans. Transgender,
non binary, and intersects. Those are all different things. What
does each mean?
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Just briefly?
Speaker 7 (03:01):
Maybe it starts. It helps to start by saying that
gender identity, which is also a concept that is mentioned
in the Trump executive orders, is how people think of
themselves in terms of being male, female, or something else.
So people who are who are transgender are people who
have a gender identity that is different from the sex
they were identified as at birth that was entered on
(03:23):
their original birth certificate. People who are non binary have
a gender identity that is not exclusively male or female,
or who prefer to just refuse the categories. And people
who are intersex are born with sexual characteristics that don't
fit a typical male or female pattern, and they can
be one of their several dozen known variations in chromosomes,
(03:46):
go and ads, genitals, or hormones.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
And why have they been lumped together by President Trump
in the sense that when he says there are only
two genders, it of course affects all of these people,
all of these groups.
Speaker 7 (03:57):
Part of what he's trying to say is that there's
he doesn't like the idea that gender identity can be
substituted for sex. He's trying to make a distinction between
how people think of themselves in terms of being male,
female or something else, and you know, the characteristics that
they're that they're that they're born with. And so yeah,
I mean, I think that he's really trying to talk
(04:19):
about people who are trans, who have transgender identities and
and say that that that's kind of not something that
the government is going to recognize.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Representative Wikendalt, what is it like for you and other
transgender Americans to be not just the focus of so
much political attention right now, but to have your rights
and even your very identity questioned all the way up
to the President of the United States.
Speaker 6 (04:43):
I mean, it's deeply frustrating and deeply disheartening. I mean, certainly,
this country has a lot of unique problems that it
needs to solve, none of which are solved by targeting
transgender people. The reality of the situation is this is
just pure based politics. It's dehumanizing politics. And I've always
said the oldest trick in politics is to say, look
(05:03):
over there, surely you don't want those people looking living
in your community. Surely you don't think those people over
there should have rights while while they're picking your pocket.
And that's what we're seeing. They're using it as a
distraction while they you know, fire federal workers, you know,
and just basically gut the government for their own benefit.
So that's why they're attacking us, is because we're a small,
(05:24):
very small percentage of the US population that's susceptible to it.
But they're you know, dismantling the government and basically fleecing
it for themselves because they can, and that's what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
As we said, you are the first trans elected official
in the state of Iowa. But your state was just
in the news because your colleagues in the legislature just
voted and then the governor Republican signed a law removing
transgender protections from state civil rights laws.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
What does that mean for you?
Speaker 6 (05:52):
I mean, it's the most frustrating thing. And the thing
that I said, you know, kind of on my floor
speech last week is like, I remember when this bill
was signed into law back in two thousand and seven,
and it was done.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
By providing protections, providing civil rights protections.
Speaker 6 (06:05):
Providing writing gender identity into the IYOW with Civil Rights
Act to protect you know, against discrimination and housing, employment,
access to credit education. All of those things were done
bi partisan lee in two thousand and seven and had
remained in state law for the better part of two decades.
The reality of the situation is is that you have
a very you know, vocal part, very vocal, but minority
(06:30):
part of the Republican Party who does not want people
like me to exist, and they will weaponize the law
to move sure that happens, and this is just one step.
And my representative Steve Whole basically said the quiet part
out loud. He's like, we need to go ahead and
do this because our bills keep getting blocked as being unconstitutional,
so we need to repeal this so we can continue
to do unconstitutional things to islands, to transgender islands.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Amy Harmon as a reporter. When you look at the
polling right now, I saw you gov poll from last year,
the found that depending on the issue, it's very different
how American people feel about this. Overall, that there's actually
broad support for civil rights protections for trans people, but
there's also broad opposition to for example, trans athletes playing
(07:15):
in women's sports. Do you have Can you make any
sense of that of where people sort of in general
right now in twenty twenty five draw the line and
they say, Okay, I'm okay with this level of rights
for trans Americans, but not this level.
Speaker 7 (07:30):
Yeah, I mean I think that it's true. I think
if you ask people, it also kind of depends on
the question. But if you ask people, you know, if
they think that trans people should be discriminated against or
should have rights, they'll say they should not be discrimined
against and should you know, have equal rights. But there
is a real discomfort and it's really reflected in the
polls about trans athletes playing in women's sports. But we
(07:54):
had a poll the New York Times and IPSOS had
a poll that suggested that eighty percent of Americans do
not want trans athletes participating in women's sports. And then,
you know, and there's also there's a discomfort or there's
a you know about way it is appropriate for miners
to get access to gender transition treatments. So those like
(08:16):
those particular issues. You know, there's there's real sentiment among
Americans that you know, there's just there that that is
they're not comfortable with those things, you know, and that's
something that in talking to transgender rights advocates a lot
of I think there's been a lot of like realization
of that and and desire to try to reach out
(08:39):
and and to educate people, Like there's many Americans more
than half of Americans don't know a transgender person, don't
realize that they know a transgender person. So I think
that looking at some of those polls has has you know,
started a conversation maybe among trans rights advocates and to
(09:00):
to try to think about how to talk about conversations.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
And we're going to get into both of those big issues,
but representative with do you see people in your community
in Iowa gradually becoming more accepting of trans people over
time or do you think that there's a backlash going
on right now in this current political moment.
Speaker 6 (09:16):
I think it's an astroturfed movement because I think you
have people with a lot of money who have nothing
better to do than to ruin people's lives. When you
bring up sports, for example, you know how many trans
athletes were the entire state of Iowa. About two So
they went out and wrote a law to ban two
trans girls from playing sports. Let's be real, this is
(09:38):
not a ubiquitous thing. This is very much targetting a
small group, a minority group. And these these these kids
weren't after elite scholarships, they weren't actively displacing female athletes.
They wanted to be part of a team in play
sports with their friends. That's the part that's getting overridden
when they do this because they use in Cndiari language,
they use dehumanizing language when they phrase this to the
(10:02):
to the American people, and it's you know, it's not
an honest conversation. It's a very one sided, very loud
conversation coming from the people who don't want us to exist.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
What do you say though, to people who maybe are
are one of the two thirds of Americans who don't
know a trans person right now and think that when
they do engage in this conversation, they're worried that they're
going to sound bigoted if they say the wrong thing.
Speaker 6 (10:27):
Well, my whole thing is like, listen, if you if
you come at this with a place of honesty and
open mindedness and want to have a legitimate conversation, then
by all means, let's have this conversation. But the thing
that always frustrates me is people arrive at answers and
then want to go ahead and talk about it and
explain why their opinion is right, where there's usually not
good faith dialogue to be had with with you know,
(10:51):
organizations that are kind of pushing these narratives like I
will absolutely one hundred percent sit down and anyone who
has good faith questions and talk about it. But like
when we're already arriving at the answer, then there's not
a conversation that we.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Had well, toll of our trans issues did play a
very big role in the presidential campaign.
Speaker 5 (11:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
President Trump's campaign spent hundreds of millions of dollars airing
ads like this one about Kamala Harris's stance on trans issues.
Speaker 9 (11:18):
Kamala support taxpayer funded sex changes for.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Prisoners, surgery for prisoners, for prisoners, every transgender inmate in
the prison system would have access.
Speaker 4 (11:29):
No, no, I don't want my taxpayer dollars going to
Kamala supports transgender sex changes in jail with our money.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
Kamala even supports letting biological men compete against our girls
in their sports.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Kamala is for day dim.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
President Trump is for you.
Speaker 10 (11:44):
I'm Donald J.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Trump, and I approved this message and we're going to
get to the politics of that in just a moment.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
On the Middle, This is the middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
If you're just tuning in the Middle as a national
call in show, we're focused on elevating voices from the middle, geographic, politically, philosophically.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Or maybe you just want to meet in the middle.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
This hour, we're talking about the current battle over trans
rights in America.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Tolliver, what is the number to call in it's eight.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
Four four for Middle that's eight four four four six
four three three five three. You can also write to
us that listen to the Middle dot com or on
social media.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
I'm joined by Iowa State Representative Amy Wickendahal and New
York Times reporter Amy Harmon. And before we get to
the phones and they are lighting up, Amy Harmon, what
about the politics of this? How important was that ad
that we just heard in Donald Trump's victory?
Speaker 7 (12:29):
Do you think It's hard to know how important it was.
But one thing that is true is that if you
watch TV during the campaign, you almost certainly saw that ad.
It was very widely aired. And so many Democrats believe
that that that strategy, that ad in particular, helped helped
(12:49):
push Trump over the edge. And so they're looking at
this issue and they're thinking this is like, this is
a hard issue for the Democrats.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
Representative Wickndahal, what do you think?
Speaker 1 (12:59):
And I I should point out that at least twenty
six states have now banned gender affirming care for minors, which,
according to the polls, many Americans think is a good thing.
Speaker 6 (13:11):
Well, they asked two questions there, So first one in
terms of how much it played victory. I don't think
it played as victor big as victory as they think.
They think that they spent two hundred million dollars and
it was not even in the top like five or
ten percent of issues that Americans identified. Americans identified a
bad economy is why they voted Trump into office. They
wanted somebody to fix what they felt was like being
(13:34):
left behind. They wanted a disrupt her the system, and
they wanted somebody to you know, help bring you know,
basically recover post inflation. That's what they wanted. That's currently
not what they're getting. Secondly, in terms of gender banning
gender affirming care, you realize this causes people to end
their lives when they are denied gender affirming care for minors.
(13:55):
You realize that right because I the transgender teenagers. I
always once a transgender kid. I did not transition until
I was twenty five, and I nearly committed suicide. I
nearly stepped in front of a train. So people who
are denied this care, the results can be devastating because
they don't have access to life saving care. I've talked
(14:16):
to you know, definitely numbers of families who have kids
who have been able to transition. And the one thing
that they always say is that after my child was
able to go ahead and transition, I saw the light
come on in their eyes. They were happier, They're able
to do the things life is worth living. And that
is what you're denying these kids the ability to have
(14:37):
a good life, and just to handwave away the fact
that they're you know that they don't care. If they
would rather have a dead kid than a trans kid.
That is what the authors of these bills would rather have.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Point very good points.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
I just want to ask you because this is the
other argument that is made against that, which is what
about what if they decide later that they wish that
they had not done that, and they've already done things
to themselves that are irreversible.
Speaker 6 (15:05):
The rate of regret is less than five percent. There
is no other medical treatment that you can get that
has such a low regret rate. Now, when you have doctors,
they can customize the plan for the individual, and a
lot of times the doctors who do go ahead and
provide this really do have not necessarily level of resistance.
But like there is a path, you can't just go
in and get hormones tomorrow. It is a path you
(15:27):
have to go through psychologists, psychiatrists, you have to be
seen with an endro chronologist, and they really do kind
of step what the path is. So like I said,
you know, they talk about regret, they talk about regret,
but the Brinlla fact is it's greater than ninety five
percent success rate, and you can't look at any other
medical treatment to see that kind of level of success rate.
(15:49):
So again it's one of those things that's missing the
forest for the trees. And again it's usually waiving that
those small number of people who had regrets over it
to completely erase the hundreds of people who had success
and found happiness with it.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
Let's go to the phones.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Alex is calling from Colorado. Alex, welcome to the middle.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Go ahead.
Speaker 11 (16:09):
I'm a computer engineer. I've been one for fifteen years,
and trans women are very much overrepresented in my industry
compared to this that's elsewhere. If you make being trans
intolerable enough in this country, you're going to see a
brain drain of the best compiler engineers. Everyone who knows Russ,
(16:29):
everyone who knows Haskel, They're all going to go to
Berlin and become you know, DJs or whatever, like, just
leaving aside the inhumanity of the cruelty of it all,
just tactically, it makes no gosh harn sense to send
all these very smart people pagging.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Interesting an economic effect, you see, Alex, Thank you for
that call, Amy Harmon. It brings up an issue, I guess,
which is, how is this playing out in corporate America?
As you've been reporting, Are these issues about trans rights
and trans acceptance uh being seen across companies and organizations.
Speaker 7 (17:10):
In terms of discrimination against trans people? They're They're definitely there.
We did have a story one of my clouds today,
I think about the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission dropping. So
under the under the Biden administration, there had been several
cases brought against employers for discrimination on the basis of
gender identity, and now the Trump administration is sort of
(17:34):
reversing force on that and in fact saying that employers
who you know, require who like, require a pronoun that
people to be called according to the pronounce of their
gender identity and use restrooms or locker rooms according to
their gender identity, you know, might be uh prosecuted for
(17:55):
for for sex discrimination. So there's been a real reversal
on that under this administration.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
Mia is calling from southeast Michigan. Mia, Welcome to the
middle your thoughts as we talk about trans rights in America.
Speaker 12 (18:10):
Hi, thanks for having me on. I'm a trans person
myself and I started transition twelve years ago, which I
have definitely noticed a big change in the tenor of
the conversation. And with respect to your guests, I vehemently
disagree with your guests from Iowa. You know, I feel
(18:32):
that I've personally been hurt by the backlash that has
been brewing. And I think a big part of the
backlash is that posturing of you know, other people just
want to ruin our lives other people. You know, there's
a very low regret rate all this, which the truth
(18:52):
of the matter is there isn't really any good evidence
either way. And as someone who's done this for twelve years,
like I wouldn't say that I necessarily regret things. But
I also, looking back with the wisdom of an adult,
I realized that maybe it wasn't totally necessary, maybe other
(19:13):
things could have happened that you know, it wasn't a
foregone conclusion that if I didn't do this thing, I
was going.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
To kill myself. So but you are you saying you
regret transitioning.
Speaker 12 (19:25):
I no, I don't regret it necessarily, but I'm not
entirely sure it's it was fully necessary. Which is sort
of the line that's always portrayed. Is it's the example
I give is it's like if you have a sprained ankle,
you don't automatically jump to surgery for a sprain ankle,
right like, you wrap it and you give rest and
(19:46):
you take advil and whatever. And I think that currently
there's really the idea that, well, surgery is the only option,
you know, we have to jump to. This is our
first line treatment.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
What do you think?
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Let me just finally ask you, MEO, what do you
think though of the sort of what President Trump has
been doing, uh and the saying that that there are
only two genders in America and that trans people can't
serve in the military.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
Et cetera.
Speaker 12 (20:13):
I mean, you know, I just renewed my passport and
I'm waiting to see, you know, what happens when I
get it back. So I'm not glad about it. But
at the same time, I have interacted with many people
who did vote for President Trump, and I have found
that as a whole, they're generally more open minded than
you expect. So I am, I am upset at President Trump,
(20:38):
but also I'm cautiously optimistic about the American people in
the long term.
Speaker 9 (20:46):
So yeah, I hope that answers your question.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yeah, amah, thank you very much. Representative Wikandal, I'll let
you respond there. I'm sure that you know there is
a diversity of opinion that you've heard, even among trans
people about about this.
Speaker 6 (20:58):
I mean, certainly there is. The one thing that I
will say is that when it comes down to this
like it, there's two things. Like I said, it didn't
start and end with sports. Governor Reynolds when she posted
this bill started with sports, moved on to gender affirm
and care and now as fully repealed civil rights protections.
(21:18):
So they and keep in mind, we existed in the
state with these protections for the better part of a
decade and a half, just minding our own business. And
the only real reason why this came up is because
Governor Reynolds wanted to make her career national She went
on Fox News to go ahead, and because it was
all the rage in twenty twenty one and twenty twenty
(21:39):
two to go ahead, and you know she was trying
to follow DeSantis's lead. Then she basically just threw everyone
for a loop and said no, I want a transports band.
And then but it didn't stop there. The next thing
that happened. She's wanting to then gender affirm and care
firm and secondly kind of on that. Nobody is saying
surgery is the first result. As I alluded to, it
is a process, and you could people who go through
(22:02):
gender transition kind of determine where that process ends. What
is cruel is the ability to ban that care, to
deny that care, to basically over like because we heard
a lot here in Iowa about parental rights, and the
people who are preaching parental rights the loudest were the
first ones to take it away from other people, and
(22:23):
so they denied their family the right to have access
to healthcare. I firmly believe that, like you should always
find the path that's right to you. I can tell
you my story and where it ended up with not
having gender affirming care, with not having to be the
ability to be out. It almost killed me. Is that
the same for everybody? No, certainly not. But like I
don't believe the government is the one that should be
(22:44):
standing in front of people's ways and their life choices
with respect to their health care.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
There's a lot of comments coming in on Laeah, go ahead.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
I'll do my question next time.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
No, right, do your question. Do your question.
Speaker 13 (22:57):
Let's do it.
Speaker 3 (22:57):
Okay, So Amy had a good question. So our last
call talked about gender markers on passports. I know, once
President Trump took off as a lot of my friends
were worried about that. I'm just wondering, like, politically, what
is sort of the end game do you foresee for
President Trump? Like how much can he do? How much
damage can he do to the transgender community? I guess
is where I'm asking.
Speaker 6 (23:17):
I mean, the goal is, like I said, too, go ahead,
and I mean with respect to incorrect gender markers, is
I mean, there are very real harms that can be
done you putting someone's incorrect gender marker on their either passport,
driver's license, whatever it may be. You know, whenever you
either interact with somebody from the government or you need
to show your ID, one of a couple of things
(23:38):
may happen. I mean, first, you inadvertently out yourself, you know,
because your gender marker doesn't match. Secondly, sometimes people will
think it's a fake ID, you know, in terms of
you know, what you're seeing in the photo doesn't match
what the markers that are on there, so you may
get further questions. And it's designed to further make interacting
(23:59):
in public life impossible.
Speaker 7 (24:02):
You know.
Speaker 6 (24:02):
The real the real like the real harm is like
when they try to like move like I said, I
think when they're looking at moving prisoners from who are
inmates on there, certainly it's a you know, there is
a violation of federal law that's happening there. I think
it's something to will maybe blank on the name. It's
something like Prevent Rape in Prison Act pre I think
is the name of it. But the question I you know,
(24:25):
then they're like, well, we're moving trans women into men's prison.
Can you imagine what someone who looks like me, what
would happen in a men's prison? Because I would like
you to imagine that horrible situation for a moment, because
that is very much what they're trying to do, and yes,
it will cause very real harm.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Let's go back to the phones in Colin and by
the way, Tulliver, you have to say which amy you're
talking to because both of our guests are named Amy.
Speaker 7 (24:52):
Actually, can I just say that, just in response to
Tulliver's question, that you know, there are a lot of
in terms, I mean, your question was, you know, how
far can Trump go in in uh? And there are
a lot of lawsuits challenging the executive orders that he's
issued on these uh, these issues. We have we I mean,
(25:16):
more broadly, we have a spreadsheet that's following I think
one hundred lawsuits not about you know about against the
Trump administration relating to all the executive orders, but I
am following about twelve specifically related to the trans issues.
So you know, for example, the other Amy mentioned moving
prisoners moving trans women from women's facilities into men's facilities.
(25:39):
That's been blocked by by a district court judge. And
so is the withholding of tender related treatments from those
prisoners for now, that's on hold. The uh uh there's
a a hearing next week on the trans military ban
that's temporarily on hold. The the withholding of federal funds
(26:03):
to hospitals that provide gender transition treatments for minors up
to age nineteen. It's also been put on hold by
a federal judge. So there's been you know, there's been
legal roadblocks put in place that are temporary. But so
we'll see where that goes. But that's that's what's happening now.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Yeah, Colin is calling from Philadelphia. Colin, Welcome to the
Middle Go ahead.
Speaker 14 (26:27):
Thanks. Yeah, I love your show. I really feel like
the you know, like this is such a new issue,
and I feel like the culture is playing a lot
of catch up, and I think it's really important to
look at other cultures that have been accepting of these
(26:48):
this kind of the people who are in this community,
you know, looking at Native American two spirits in Thailand,
Lady boy. I mean, there's there's this tradition around the
world of creating a space outside of gender really and
creating a third gender or a third space outside of
(27:11):
sex really that I think is really important from a
spiritual perspective to have a level of respect for the
community on a on a level that's more that's deeper
than any kind of like physical trait. And I think
looking into that tradition and looking at the you know,
(27:35):
the way that people in other cultures respect people in
a spiritual sense is so important and and not I
feel like the the politicization and especially around use of
pronouns in in kind of a way that is that
is kind of a kind of a virtue signal or
or a you know, demand that we that we kind
(27:59):
of make of peace people. I don't think that's I
think that's been a not a very helpful way of
relating to people on a very un emotional and spiritual
kind of way.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Yeah, Colin, thank you very much for that, Amy Wikendall.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
I did see today on the issue of the pronouns
that people put that Governor Greg Abbott in Texas fired
somebody who didn't take the pronouns.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
Off of the signature who worked for the state.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Just briefly, your your your thoughts on the on the signatures,
on the on the pronouns.
Speaker 6 (28:32):
So I'd like to say say that phrase back. You
fired somebody because they put their pronouns in their femail. Really,
you took somebody's job, career, life, hope and dreams and
fired them for that.
Speaker 13 (28:44):
Really.
Speaker 6 (28:45):
Yeah, Really, that's where we're at as a country. You're
firing some because there are like legitimate reasons to have
those because you don't necessarily know based on name alone,
if the person you're speaking to is male or female,
or other or identifies as other. Like if you have
jen neutral names, or even a name that may be
is traditionally assigned to one gender, but may the person
(29:05):
may be a member of the opposite gender. When you're
not interacting with that person in a visual or auditory sense,
having pronouns may make sense to understand who you were
in fact speaking to. It doesn't necessarily mean you're talking
to someone who is identifying as transgender. But I think
it's absolutely ridiculous that you would destroy someone's career because
they put their pronouns in their emails signature. It's ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Well, stand by right there, you know, Tolliver.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
The liberal Democratic governor of California, Gavin Newsom, just came
out against trans athletes in girls sports. This is one
area that has attracted a lot of controversy.
Speaker 3 (29:38):
Yeah, some athletes, you know, express support for transgender athletes,
while others have not. Here's former collegiate swimmer Riley Gains
speaking against the inclusion of trans athletes just last year.
Speaker 15 (29:48):
The unfair competition that we faced, the locker room, the
silencing we face from our universities, and then the bigger
picture of why this matters and what's ultimately at stake.
If we don't have pe willing to defend women's spaces
and defend the truth.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
That is a very big part of this conversation. We're
going to be back with more of your calls on
the Middle in a moment.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
This is the Middle.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
I'm Jeremy Hobson. In this hour, we're talking about the
battle over trans rights in America. You can call us
at eight four four four Middle. That's eight four four
four six four three three five three. You can also
reach out to us at listen tooth Middle dot com.
My guests are New York Times reporter Amy Harmon and
Iowa State Representative Amy Wickendahl. And let's go to the
phones because they are lighting up. Tara is calling from Colorado.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
Tara, Welcome to the Middle. Go ahead with your thoughts thoughts.
Speaker 8 (30:40):
Hi, thanks so much for taking my call and for
hosting a show on this topic. I'm a parent of
a transgender teenager and we've been on a learning journey
with our child for about the last eight years, and
I just one of the things that really troubles me
about the way this issue is being framed in the
(31:02):
national dialogue and in policies such as banning transgender service
members from the military, is it's being framed as an
issue of being fraudulent. We're dishonest, and I just want
to share our experience. I know is consistent with many
other families and transgender people that as I've observed my
child when they were starting at about five or six
(31:25):
years old, there was a distress going on that we
couldn't really identify for a while. And as we continue
to just listen to our child and consult with consult
with mental health professionals and others, we realized that our
child was dealing with a deep sense of discord in
(31:46):
their in their being. And as we started to go
listen to them and they said, hey, I want to
wear these clothes instead of these clothes, I want to
Can we cut my hair this way instead of this way,
what we saw was our child become the discord lift,
the kind of the dark cloud lifted, and there was
this there was this kind of life that came into them,
and we've just continued to follow their lead. There's in
(32:08):
no way that we've ever pushed or suggested or you know,
or led our child. We've really just been following their
lead and consultation with with people who really are working
with the evidence. And I want to say that what
I know about what it means how our bodies and
our psyches are when we're truthful, is you know, we're
(32:29):
in better health. We are able to function in the world,
We're able to participate in careers and schools, and you know,
when we're truthful, there's evidence that that our that our
health is better and our outlook and everything is better.
And that's what I see with my child when they're
affirmed in the way they want to express their gender,
their their mental health and everything and their performance in
(32:49):
the world is consistent with truthfulness and integrity. And so
I see as we've been able to affirm their gender
as they've grown up, they've and they they've been able
to seek gender firm and care from their pediatrician so
they didn't have to go through a puberty that was
causing them to scream on the floor, right, And like
we're able to get some life saving medication for them
(33:12):
that allows them to become a straight a student in school,
maintain a job, have a relationship, have a future vision
for themselves. And the last thing I'll say is that
as a parent, I want to be able to say
to my child, if you work hard in this country,
you can be anything you want to be. And I
can't currently say that to my transgender child because I
(33:33):
know that career in military is currently being cut off
to them, possibly travel is being cut off to them.
The entire country has shrunk by about fifty percent for
my child to just be able to move freely and
be in public spaces, and that's not something any parent
wants to have to talk.
Speaker 11 (33:49):
With or chappen about.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
Tarah, thank you very much for that call. Amy Harmon,
I'll just go to you.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
I'm sure you've spoken to many parents of trans kids
and trans teens. What do you think of that and
just the idea of truthfulness versus you know, perhaps some
who are who are coming against trans Americans saying that
they're not being honest about what's going on.
Speaker 7 (34:11):
Yeah, I think I'm glad. I'm glad to have that color.
I think expressed a lot of sentiment that is, you know,
widely widely echoed among the parents of trans youth that
I've talked to, and I've talked to people you know,
certainly in recent weeks who are really trying to figure
out what to do, worried about their children, not you know,
(34:33):
their hospital's canceling appointments for gender reforming care. Some of
them are thinking of leaving the country. So yeah, so,
I mean, I think that is an experience that's that
a lot of people are having now. And I do
think that this issue of what is the truth is
(34:55):
fundamental to what's going on here, and and there's I
mean so, but I will also say that when I
talk to you know, social conservatives, people who are you know,
skeptical of of of trans participation in public life, which
is kind of what we're we're talking about here, there's
this sense of that, you know, that there are these
(35:15):
fundamental biological differences between men and women, and that is
feeling like people are not acknowledging that, and they wanted
to be acknowledged. And that's kind of you know, for
people who are I'm talking to who are happy about
these executive orders, that's what they are saying. They're saying,
you know, finally we're seeing, we're seeing like reality acknowledged
(35:38):
that that you know, we want to be able to
express this biological differences without being labeled you know, called
a bigot or so, you know, I I do think
there's this disconnect between like what Tara is talking about,
that is that is obviously very real, what what our
child is going through and what our child feels and
(35:59):
so you know, trans people are real, they exist. So
but there's some inability I think to really connect on
on this issue of, you know, what is biological biological sex.
I think like I'm working on a story now where
I'm trying to get biologists and legal scholars and trans
(36:21):
advocates and you know, politicians to like talk to me
about how they define sex biology and it's it's it's hard.
Speaker 6 (36:30):
It's hard.
Speaker 7 (36:30):
So he's already even among biologists. So you know, I
think that is a conversation that we need to start having.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
H And let's get to more of our conversation with Aaron,
who's calling from Jackson, Michigan.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Aaron, Welcome to the middle.
Speaker 9 (36:43):
Go ahead, Hey, hi, thanks for taking me on. So,
as a lifelong conservative and a never trumper, and my
girlfriend has a friend she's known for thirty years who
has recently transitioned, and for her to be told that
she doesn't know the woman experience has been kind of infuriating,
not necessarily for me, for my girlfriend obviously, but if
(37:05):
they were less vocal about it and you just blend in,
you can learn people will see you as a person,
no longer as an identity or as a title, and
they will not be threatened by that. And it's just
something that I feel that Trump has been able to
use against the community. And I am so against these
people being singled out and being enraged, you know, or
(37:28):
having bigots enraged at who they are when all they
are is good people. But by having a subset of
the community take it over and say look at me,
look at me, look at me, the squeaky wheel gets
a grease, and in this case, it's not a good
type of grease to get. And I just feel that
if we talked about that more and we were able
to make them people instead of a thing, we would
(37:49):
have less of these problems.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
But you're saying, in part that's because trans people, you feel,
are being too vocal about being trans.
Speaker 9 (37:57):
Some right, not all of them obviously. So again, in
this one instance, I know a couple of trans people,
but my girlfriend is being told by her friend who
recently transitioned to female, you don't understand the woman experience.
That was just that was shocking to me.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
Aaron, I thank you for calling in, and I'm going
to go to Representative Wickandahal. What do you think about
that what Aaron said, I'm trying to.
Speaker 6 (38:23):
Parse it a little bit, but I mean in terms
of like we in some cases have to be vocal
because our lives are on the line. Like you know,
like I said, I'll connect go back to it. Like
I said, we had the Civil Rights Act in Iowa
for the better part of twenty years and we were
just people minding our business, just going about it. They
still came after us anyway. You know, all we were
(38:46):
doing is trying to go about our daily lives, going
to our jobs, spending time with her families. We weren't
bothering anybody. And you know national political trends, this just
became the hot button fad for people to punch down.
So I mean, we can stay quiet, they'll still come
after us.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
You know, well what do you think of like like
so for right now, we have the first trans member
of Congress, Sarah McBride, who is it seems specifically not
making that the issue that she talks about. She's like
I'm here to bring down costs for my constituents. What
do you think of that as a as a strategy
as sort of one of the most maybe the most
(39:27):
high profile trans politician out there right now.
Speaker 6 (39:30):
I mean, and she's doing the work, She's doing the
work that she ran to do in her constituents elected
to and she, yeah, probably keeps her head down and
is less vocal about it than a lot of people are.
And she's still attacked anyway. You know, from your Marjorie
Taylor Green's or your Nancy mace Is, they're the ones
who are out there trying to basically just make you know,
(39:54):
going to the bathroom of crime and just you know,
they're the ones that are there, that are that are
screaming a loud as she's there trying to work for constituents.
You know, I will say personally, like I ran for
both local office and state office, I didn't make my
identity part of the cornerstone of my campaign. My first
campaign slogan was stand with local businesses. And I had
(40:16):
to become far more vocal in defense of the trans
community because we were being attacked and as the first state,
first openly electric trans women both in local government and
now state government. That responsibility falls to me to speak
up for my community. But you know, for the better
part of like the earlier part of my political career,
(40:37):
I was the one who is out there like talking
about lowering taxes and property taxes and building multi family homes.
Those are the things that I focused on, and those
are a lot of the things that I love to
focus on. But this these issues, you know, regardless of
whether we're quiet or whether we're loud, they push these
issues regardless, They attack our community regardless.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
I am going to go to the next call, but
there's technical problem, So I'm going to ask Jason, our engineer,
to go to line seven and John who is joining us?
Speaker 2 (41:07):
John, Hello, welcome to the middle all.
Speaker 10 (41:10):
Right, awesome.
Speaker 7 (41:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 10 (41:12):
I come from a conservative background. I even voted for
Trump in twenty sixteen, but I learned pretty quickly that
he's not really worthy of the office. And I fear
for the transgender people and anybody else in the LBG community,
even though I have no real connection to any of them.
I feel like they have a right to live their
(41:33):
life anyway they want to, and for them to make
it essentially open season. The people that support Trump. Many
of them are bigoted, racist, and I don't think our
country should be encouraging that in any way. You know,
(41:53):
it's appalling to me the things that Trump says and does.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
John, thank you.
Speaker 1 (41:58):
I appreciate the call. And Amy Harmon. You know, it
makes me wonder about the as you as you've looked
at the support on the Republican side for some of
the things that Trump is doing on trans issues. Is
this something that is politically popular for when he attacks
trans people or or decides they're not going to be
allowed in the military and things like that.
Speaker 6 (42:19):
Well, I think.
Speaker 7 (42:20):
Something that that the other Amy said earlier, I you know,
I wanted to is true, which is that what what
Americans care about is when when they're asked to rank
what they actually care about in terms of issues, trans
issues is always on the bottom of the list. It's always,
you know, the economy, job solution, right, So so that
(42:41):
is that is that is true? So but it does
you know this, this issue does seem to resonate with
some portion of the Republican base, and and and it's
broader than that. I mean, it's you know, some centrist
Democrats also, you know, resonate resonate with this. So I
think that that's that's just a political reality, and that's
(43:02):
part of why, you know, we've seen five executive orders
focusing on trans issues when people are you know, maybe
two percent of the population right right.
Speaker 1 (43:12):
Brian's calling from Arlington, Massachusetts. Hi, Brian, welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 13 (43:17):
Hi there, thank you. It's my first time ever calling
into a show. So I'm a I'm a CIS male
in my fifties, father of four teens here in Arlington,
mass And what I don't understand is what I learned
from my grandfather is we're a melting pot. I've learned
this all my life. We're a melting pot of all
different shape, shapes and sizes. And I always told my
(43:39):
kids were cut from the same cloth. And I don't
know what I feel that Trump reaches for is fear,
fear of things that he doesn't understand or he doesn't know,
which could be many things, but it's xenophobia. He's people
(44:00):
I can say biggeted this out of the other but
they're fearful of what they don't understand, and he reaches
for that and he grabs for it. But the thing being,
why is this the first thing that he goes for.
Instead of trying to help where help is needed, he
is trying to take rights away from the people that
(44:22):
live in this country and were born in this country.
His big thing is illegal is coming great. But you
know something, it's why is this the big thing? These
are people who are taxpayers, who are fighting for this country,
(44:43):
and it's doing nothing but kneecapping the military, kneecapping or businesses.
What it's doing is it's throwing a hiccup into everything.
It's it's it's a monkey wrench into gears. Should have
never changed.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
Brian, I got to let you go there because we
just were running out of time here. But Representative Wichandahal,
I'll go to you. Why do you think Trump is
focusing on the trans community? And I let me bring
it to the question that we asked of the hour
to wrap it up here, what is the way forward?
How do we have this conversation and make sure that everybody,
(45:21):
every American can have equality and respect and rights.
Speaker 6 (45:26):
I mean it's a couple conversations, a couple questions to
answer your questions here real quick. I find it interesting,
like if we go back to when Trump first ran
in twenty sixteen. It was kind of interesting because it
reminded me I remember he kind of trolled Ted Cruz
because Ted Cruz was the one that was obsessed with
the trans community. But one thing that you know about
(45:48):
the president, he is a bit of a nurs He
is a narcissist, and he listens to the voices who
pay him homage and basically kisses. But the most that's
how you curry favor with Donald Trump, kid like. And
the far right, not necessarily the far right, but the
(46:08):
basically the dominionists, the Christian nationalists within the kind of
the right wing of this figured that out early and
that's kind of why they went all in for Trump.
And so now that they're in the inner circle, he
will do what they want because they're the ones, lack
for a better word, basically kissing up to him. And
you know, as far as the way forward, I mean,
(46:33):
I think we have to call it what it is.
I mean, at the end of the day, it is
very much, you know, like what it's an attack on
It's an attack on who we are as Americans. If
we're to be a free and open people, then we
have to realize that it is not okay to it
is an unacceptable to demonize part of the American population
(46:55):
to score political points. We have to make that unacceptable
and political discourse again. We have to call it what
it is.
Speaker 10 (47:04):
And I do believe.
Speaker 6 (47:08):
You know, it reminds me a little bit too of
you know, when we were still having the marriage equality
debate ten to fifteen years and you had like Fred
Phelps and his church always showing up being the most extreme.
And I think that this, the fact that they're going
so extreme, will further push basically, it'll help. At the
(47:31):
end of the day, we will further advance the cause
of equal rights in this country because we can see
what happens when we don't have them.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
That is Iowas State Representative Amy Wickendaalal. We've also been
speaking with New York Times reporter Amy Harmon. I want
to thank you both so much for a great conversation
this hour. Thanks and next week we're going to be
taking your questions on all things artificial intelligence, and you
can call in as always at eight four four four
Middle that's a four four four six four three through
five three. You can reach out at Listen to the
(48:00):
Middle dot com, where you can also sign up for
our free weekly newsletter, The Middle is brought to you
by Longkook Media, distributed by Illinois Public Media in Urbana, Illinois,
and produced by Harrison Patino, Danny, Alexander Samburmas, Does, John Barth, Anicadessler,
and Brandon Condritz. Our technical director is Jason Croft. I'm
Jeremy Hobson, and I will talk to you next week
Host
Jeremy Hobson
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