Chapo Trap House - 892 - Talking Points Memo feat. Jael Holzman (12/10/24)

Episode Date: December 10, 2024

We catch up briefly on news around the arrest of the alleged UHC CEO assassin. Then, journalist and musician Jael Holzman returns to the show to discuss a new piece she has for Rolling Stone on the potential threats to trans people in the coming Trump administration. We look at the rather grim potential of massively undermining of trans medical care, the equally grim state of Democratic opposition, and the general fecklessness with which Democrats have handled what Joe Biden once called the “civil rights issue of our time” in both policy and rhetoric. Read Jeal’s piece here: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/trump-trans-health-care-republicans-democrats-1235198473/ Purchase Refaat Alareer’s “If I Must Die” here: https://bookshop.org/p/books/if-i-must-die-poetry-and-prose/21530923?ean=9781682196212&gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiAgdC6BhCgARIsAPWNWH3V8BcDXv-gg8uxdBjH7qVFtCKGHzt5Z5bMBSUunOfyar68lDFw5EwaAtCmEALw_wcB

All I wanna do is hit the drum All I wanna do is hit the drum They're calling it Luigi's new mansion, prison, where Luigi, the guy who killed Brian Thompson, is going the only GameCube he'll be using is the secret boxing ring underneath the prison. Folks, we've talked about the liberal driller on the show but the Lindy Man driller? This is a whole new saga unfurling here. Hello, everybody. It's Monday, December 9th. And we've got Chapo coming at you on today's show. We will be discussing the current state of trans rights and health care in America,

at least on the cusp of the next Donald Trump administration, with returning guest Jail Holzman, a journalist and a rock musician. Jale, welcome back to the show. It's a pleasure to be here. I should probably start by congratulating you on both on your excellent journalism, but also on your rock group Echo Astral, it was just named Pitchfork's rock album of the year, Pink Balloons. Yeah, it's a good time to do promotion for music.

Yeah, thank you. It's time to do promotion for music. Yeah, thank you. It's fun to get recognized for sure. Check them out. I think they've got a hip new sound you guys will all really enjoy. Cha-chao. No, but I want to start off talking to you. I mean, it's it's it's health care related. But I mean, I have to talk about it right off the jump because Felix and I we talked

about this just on Thursday's episode. But I got to ask Felix, what do you make of the United Healthcare shooter? Apparently, allegedly, it's this guy, Luigi. Yeah. I mean, like, I don't know if this is everyone's, like, first day in this country, but like anyone who expected this guy to have like coherent beliefs. Listen, I mean, there are talkers and there are do-ers in America. Talkers have an articulated system of beliefs, for better or for worse, whether it is redistributionist or, you know, I hate the pope. Let's get a new pope and put him in charge of everything.

Let's become easy. They have a system of beliefs that roughly you can categorize it. The doers in this country, those are the people that are all over the place, probably because that's like most Americans. People have unfairly called this guy a bunch of things, but I just, you know, he's a good looking buffoon and he likes a little bit of everything. When I was looking at, you know, like this sort of dossier on this guy's online history, he really struck me as finally in America we have our own Mishima. He's like Mishima if Mishima only listened to Lex Friedman and Andrew Huberman podcasts. Our Mishima would be you know Mishima one of the greatest

writers of all time but you know probably kind of a downer to be around. It makes sense that the American Mishima would be a little more of a smiley guy. Well I mean I find the circumstances of his arrest to be rather puzzling. I mean, it seemed like it was all going according to plan. And then he just gets grasped in a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania with the murder weapon on him. Okay, so I've heard two different like one, like this one's probably true that just like an elderly patron grasped him out. Like some Korean, one of the last living Korean war veterans. But the first thing I heard was that

he got his ID checked at McDonald's. And that was, I mean, you know, is there a secret menu at McDonald's? Can you order a margarita there? Yeah, I don't know what's going on with that. I think it's more likely it was just like a silent generation snitch. That's more likely. But how did they recognize him?

Because I've seen about like eight different photos of this guy and there is no way I would have been able to pick him out if he was standing right next to me. I mean, he is a hunk. It was in Altoona, Pennsylvania. And he has that smile that lights up the room. And they were like, this is the first guy that's ever smiled in our town in like 40 years since the industrialization. This is one of those like John Fetterman type towns. Needs a new basketball hoop. The old one is broken. Yeah, we're something, you know, like the father,

you know, the guy whose dad, you know, invented collateral debt swaps or whatever. His, you know, he goes out, he joins the Peace Corps and then he becomes mayor of a town like this and it's like, everyone chewed on all their hoodie strings. We need more. Then he becomes senator. And they, when they saw a guy smiling, they were like, he's not from here. Well, I mean, I guess like the in summation, I think all you need to know about the United Healthcare Shooters politics allegedly, is that he didn't listen to Choppo Trap House, you know, you can take take that take that for what you will. I don't know if that's good or bad. But it's just a fact of life that we have to deal with.

Alright, well, without further ado, we've had enough fun at the top of the episode, but I do want to talk to our guest this episode, JL Holzman, who has a new piece coming out in Rolling Stone, headline, Will Democrats Let the GOP Gut Trans Healthcare? And I guess I'll just I'll start there, Joe. So obviously, like I said, we're on the cusp of another Trump administration. And it does seem that trans people, trans healthcare and trans rights seems to be like in the fixed in the in the sights of an incoming right wing government.

So let's just start with as things stand now, how do Republicans plan to go about doing away with trans health care in America? Like what are they set their sights on and what are the mechanisms through which they are intending to, I don't know, like make this an issue or deny care to people. Well, thank you for having me on and for holding court for this conversation. You know, a lot of us certainly have contempt for our health care system, and that's why we talk about CEO shooters as well as people who get upset because insurance is paying for something or another.

In this particular case, it's not kids, it's not sports, it's not bathrooms. The subject of my reporting for Rolling Stone is on the likelihood of Republicans in Congress finding a way to restrict access to hormonal medications, surgical procedures, or even just general healthcare support for, including mental healthcare support for trans people, people who suffer from gender dysphoria, that difference between one's body as it currently stands and the place that their mental state, frankly, most comfortably situates in. And the reporting is thus, that there's an unfortunately sizeable likelihood that there is at least conversation about tying funding the government to legislation that would ban the government from giving money to anyone who performs this care. You know it's it's a it's similar the way that

the government handles abortion for most people in the United States. This amendment, the Hyde Amendment, was actually enacted under Democratic President Jimmy Carter. And what the Hyde Amendment did, what came after the ruling in Roe v. Wade, what it did was it said that the federal government couldn't give certain funds to the medical industry if it performed abortions except for in very specific limited circumstances. What we're going to see here and with the language that Republicans have proposed is actually far broader.

It would essentially say that no federal program at all, any part of the federal government can give money to anyone who performs this care. And what that would mean is essentially a gag order on the government. And the question is whether or not it's going to happen. I was on your, thank you for having me on your podcast earlier this year, talking about how I actually quit my job as a reporter in Congress in part over my former colleague's reluctance, Stephen Wright, about this. And after going on podcasts and doing EAH hits and yelling loudly saying, why aren't

you covering this? No one did. So Rolling Stone was kind enough to let me investigate how we got here where without it even being a subject of conversation in a political debate nationally, we could have a conversation quite quickly about whether or not we'll see most trans Americans lose access to this care. And I can get into the specifics of it as well as how we got here and what people can do

if they care, but yeah, I mean, that's the unfortunate grim circumstance that we find ourselves in today. I wanna go back to this comparison that you made between What's being proposed in terms of like a ban on federal funding and the Hyde Amendment? like why is federal funding so important and why is it such a crucial choke point for the administration of and denial of

This kind of health care like you mentioned because of the Hy Amendment, like the Hyde Amendment is the reason that like abortions are not performed in hospitals. They have to be like if it's still legal in that state at like a discrete abortion clinic. Like what is the comparison here? And like again, why is it such a crucial choke point of excess? Sure. Well, I mean, first and foremost, federal funding dictates the rule of the road in this country so often for many industries. You know, the oil industry, the healthcare industry, materials industry, you name it. People rely on subsidies, tax credits, grants, what have you, especially innovative sectors. And, you know, healthcare, more than most relies on subsidies. What this would say is essentially, you know, it's, it's, it would say under no

program, essentially under any law, could the government give money to people who perform this care and why federal dollars matter here is if you're an industry that relies on federal funding, at least in part to square out, especially with inflation these days, you're going to choose maintaining that access to funding over performing care that is, you know, certainly statistically significant. Trans people represent anywhere between 1% to 2% of the country, according to recent surveys. But the unfortunate thing is that it's small enough of a population that medical establishments may go, you know, we need to make sure we have that money, so

we're going to stop performing this. Why that matters for trans people in particular, you know, the difference between abortion and these surgeries and hormone dispositions, this is a highly specialized form of care. And even though the United States has been innovating ahead of other countries in part on research and expertise here, there's been a recently growth in the availability of this access to this care. But because this is such a highly specialized form

of medicine and it's still in its growth stage, its initial growth stage, you're essentially telling a whole private sector that if it wants to maintain access to federal funding, it has to stop this. And we do that with things like doing business with China, which by the way, talk about whatever else you want with that. But like, you know, it's hardwired for an American to say, well, we don't want you to do business in China. Well, imagine trans people being China in this particular case. That wouldn't exactly be good for, you know, that the 1.5% of this country that happens to need that care.

So, you know, that unfortunately we're in a situation where a handful of Democrats will decide whether or not most trans people get to live or die. And that's not exactly the easiest feeling in the world. And that's... I don't know. What do you think about that? It doesn't exactly make me sleep easy. Well, I mean, I guess like the most of the article, like the head is, will Democrats let them do it? So, I mean, like this is what the Republicans are planning, like based on your reporting, I mean, like this is what the Republicans are planning, like based on your reporting. Perhaps more relevant here is what the Democrats are planning to do about it, if anything, because I mean, like this would be something that, as you point out,

would require them behaving, behaving basically as entirely as a block without any deviations in terms of a vote. But also like you get the indication that this is political capital that they want to spend, especially in light of the fact that like another thing you're reporting points out is like how stung they feel by the Trumps they them add on a national level. Sure. So, you know, taking a step back, it would certainly be the case that the Trump administration is going to be very painful for trans Americans and their family members. You know, JD Vance himself introduced legislation that would enact this ban and has also called

trans people perverts. You know, Trump wants to, you know, tell the government that it should stop endorsing this care at any age. A leading candidate for the Federal Trade Commission, like the anti-trust thing, is saying he's going to use the agency to investigate the doctors in this care instead of investigating anti-trust violations. It's going to be a pretty loud and anti-trans administration. But you know, if we know anything from the Biden administration, it's that it's pretty easy to look weak

when you don't have Congress on your side and you don't have popular will on your side. So the real question is, what kind of lasting damage could be done to this population and its healthcare? It's right. And what my reporting shows is this, it's this language, it's this provision

in funding legislation that will be a top priority for some in Congress and in the administration come next year. And it's a jump ball as to whether or not if Republicans wanted to say, fund the government and cut off this care or keep trans people alive but fund the government, that the handful of Democrats that would be required to stop this from happening wouldn't fold. I mean, yes, people on the left and the right, some people on the left and the right really

don't like the filibuster. The filibuster is the only reason why this can't happen immediately. Um, it would require about six Democrats to stop this from happening with the filibuster. Um, but it, I mean, this is a question that people in Congress aren't answering. It's something that people in Congress don't even know how to talk about. Um, and I had, I, for this story, I had copious conversation with staffers, political advisors, civil rights advocates, democratic lawmakers, to try and understand if any of these folks had this on their radar, that like a ban on federal funding to anyone

who performs this care was even on the radar. And honestly, most people who work in democratic politics today don't even really know how to talk about trans people. Asking them to defend this population at this moment is like asking them to explain how to assemble an Ikea dresser without the map. It's really bad. It's like, I would ask them where they get their talking points from and they'd say, good question. This was like the comment referring was good question.

And yeah I mean I could go on and on it it's actually I mean I would recommend folks read the story I because I don't like to represent folks quotes outside of myself but you know the the fact that you can get on the horn with one of the Pods Same America guys and he'll go, yeah, we should definitely stop this, but even I would admit we don't know how to talk about it, is a sign that folks are uncomfortable. And it helps explain, I think, why an ad that ran during football games occasionally is dominating so many pundits' minds because they don't know how to wrap their head around it. I mean, we feel like when they when they don't know how to talk about it, like, you know, they

don't know where to get their talking points from. I mean, like, you know, I got my talking points from my brain. I just like decided what I what I feel about something and then I talk about it. But like, where I mean, where does that begin? I mean, like, I mean, what do you say, like, they don't know how to talk about it? Like, did they feel uncomfortable just even broaching the issue or do they feel vulnerable? Like this is a political liability. Like if this were the rights of any other minority of a group, even a relatively small minority group, wouldn't be sort of like, I don't know, like the template. Isn't that there for like the defending the defense of the rights of, you know, ethnic, religious and sexual minorities?

Like, isn't the playbook written for this? Like what, what accounts for this perplexion on the democratic's part, democratic party's part about what to say and do. The fact they lost to Donald Trump again. I, so, so, you know, the, the day after the election, I pitched Rolling Stone as I was seeing that this narrative was calcifying in my region of the woods, which is, I live in DC, bless my heart. And the narrative seemed to be powered by pundit takes taking one poll, literally just one poll, extrapolating the third most important thing, which happened to just say trans issues in it, and then saying that was the whole election. And I was like seeing it happen in real time, Matt Iglesias, some other liberal people,

Chris Salisa, it was just like a pylon. And I wanted to know if it actually mattered. I mean, I myself am trans, but I'll admit that even I understand if people get annoyed that I'm telling them what to say all the time. And I'm not going to sit here and say that I agree with them. But the trans community itself is not necessarily enjoying broad popular support right now. It wouldn't necessarily surprise me if some anti-trans rhetoric happened to actually sway the election. But the problem is that everyone in the beltway that works in these circles started spinning

up even before we had full election results, like even before we had an understanding as to whether or not people who voted for Biden last time came out and voted for Trump. Like people didn't really have a frame of reference. The margin looked worse for Democrats than before. And honestly, it just felt like people were throwing us into the bus. So I wanted to know what was the worst thing that could possibly happen. And unfortunately, as this story publishes, I think we're at risk of going to that worst case scenario, which is that Democrats start to say that Democrats start to say that trans women aren't women and trans men aren't men. It's buried in the story, but at least one Democratic lawmaker in Texas,

Vicente Gonzalez, is leaving the door open to voting to ban his own colleague, Sarah McBride, from the bathroom. And I think this is happening because if you lean on 40, 50, 60 year olds who don't know any trans people to explain an issue like this without advice from their trusted people or from interest groups that have a lot of money, you're going to just wind up having these people say whatever thought is in their head, which is just like, I don't want boys in the girls bathroom, even if they don't even know what that means, they'll just say stuff like that. You're just kind of leaving these people

to dictate the lives of this minority group based on their own wins or whatever's in their own hearts. That's a difficult place to be in without a public debate over the issue, right? That's like, it's asking Joe Schmo to to decide life or death for like, 2% of the population. Well, like you said, when it comes to these, sorry, when it comes to these, like talking points, there's like, rather

than the issue of healthcare, you mentioned like, you know, this piece is not about sports, bathrooms, or kids, but that does seem to be where this debate always goes. And then like on any of those issues, there does seem to be these sort of like common sensical, like, you know, answers like I don't think boys should use the girls bathroom or I don't think boys should compete in girls sports because that's unfair. What is in your opinion, the beginnings of responses to that kind of reasoning or like that line of argumentation,

which like like you know like I think to like people who are not well versed in this rings true and it kind of like a simple way easy to understand way. Well I mean so the origins of the anti-trans movement itself are a little amorphous and disparate. I mean you can point to different moments in time, whether it be, you know, the Janice Raymond and the transsexual empire and stuff in the 80s or, you know, the rise of the TERF movement and radical feminism, or you could point to, you know, the post-gay marriage legalization push to just find a new token to marginalize amongst the social

conservative movements. You can point to any of these places, but in its foundation, the problem here comes back to Generation X, which itself came of age and grew older at a time when transphobic pop culture in particular was quite rampant. time when transphobic pop culture in particular was quite rampant. And you kind of find this trickle down moment where folks like Dave Chappelle, J.K. Rowling, who became the celebrity studior in that moment, they're of course some of the loudest voices having an influence here. And so if you have a base of politics, right, like the Democratic Party itself, as pollsters and advocates have explained to me, as even some lawmakers have explained to me, is at some level, at least, 1.5 percents of the population, you can have a majoritarian view that can be politically harmful to those populations. Like immigration is a great example, right?

And so in this particular case, the fate of the Democratic Party on some level rests on them Navigating whether or not they save trans people because it will as you as you rightfully put well like You think this would be easy, right? I mean, this is the party that for so long tried to be the champion on civil rights But people forget that even the Democratic Party has struggled with gay marriage Being accepted a lag behind the public. I mean, this is a circumstance that is, I mean, this is existential on some level. If they throw us under the bus, and it's yet to be determined, right? But if they did, right, what was that going to show, especially after what they've

done with the Palestinian people, especially if they're doing immigrants and the asylum rights, there's going to be a bit of a the stakes of their ability to be the shepherd or on the line on some level. Just going off what we saw from the 2020 campaign, I mean, we saw this on like, I'd say like most issues, they were kind of pushed on, the Harris campaign, but specifically with this, specifically with transit issues, the strategy seemed to be, and I fear it also will be going forward, that they're kind of training it like what they tell you to do when a leopard sees you on a hiking trail.

Just don't move and no one will see you. Like what, what are the, like, yourself as big as possible. It's the opposite of that. Yeah. Yeah. Does it stay totally still? I mean, there were so many bad fucking answers that, uh, Kamala gave during the

campaign. Um, I'm one of the only people that watched that MSNBC town hall, which is horrible. But there was one of the sit down interviews she did in sort of like the final quarter of the campaign where she gave that infamous answer. I will follow the law on this, which is like, it just seems like this strategy for like the past year is like, just don't move, don't do anything, just bury your head in the sand until like you can ascertain public opinion one way or the other and just go with that. And it's, it's just like, there is like a devil's advocate thing where it's like, okay,

like the way to win the culture war stuff is to not play, but this isn't really that. This is just like, yeah. The issue here, Ray, is so, I mean, I've had a lot of conversations with staffers, with pollsters, et cetera, on this particular topic, Ray, of like, should Democrats respond to anti-trans rhetoric? And there's two issues. The first one is you're playing

whack-a-mole with conspiracy theories. Nine times out of ten, any argument that comes out about trans people is misconstruing science or the way the world just works. Basic numbers, right? And so you're arguing with people who are the statistic equivalent of climate denialists, right? So like, rebutting that is a bit of a challenge. But that being said, right, Democrats have a message on climate. It's follow the science.

What does the science tell us? The science is X. The issue here is that Democrats don't really have a message to coalesce around. And that's what, when Will was asking about talking points, that's what my reporting gets into. So with such depth, really, it's like staff never prepared right

like the first bathroom ban was in North Carolina almost almost a decade ago and people were boycotting it was a huge deal governor lost his real action Republican governor right Democrats never crafted a message it's been ten years of wait for the leopard to go away. It's been 10 years of, of what do we do with this birthing people? I don't want to say that, but also, um, I don't want to say women's rights. It's, it's, they don't know how to talk about it. And where that becomes a problem is, you know, polls, the trans people did not decide this election, but polls do show that the advertising got average Americans to start associating a focus on trans people and other marginalized people as anathema to their economic concerns, as not focusing on their economic concerns.

That's where the ad did work. It didn't win the election, but it did get people to associate helping trans people with their own negative economic situation, which is bad, I think, generally for acceptance. If you can do that to anyone, you can pick apart Democratic coalition forever. The issue is that people on the Hill, people in DC don't see it that way. It's the same thing as post 2020. If you talk to them, if anyone in my business reporting, just go talk to them. These people see it as the same thing as Black Lives Matter, right? Where it's like, oh, George Floyd, you know, defund the police somehow hurt us in the 2020 election. It's the same beltway narrative that doesn't really

get born out in facts. And in this particular case, right, let's say Republicans were to decide to try and put it to a vote. Do we fund the government and kill most trans people? Or, well, I don't want to be that hyperbolic, but kill a lot of trans people. Or you can shut down the government and, and well, I mean, the trans people still won't get care, but you know, because the money will go out. But it ultimately, if you even hold it to a vote, or if you can propose to do that, you're you're you're asking these folks to get into a position where they have to suddenly A, know how to talk about this thing that they never really wanted to talk about in the first place, and B, go up against their own convention, their own their own gut instinct that's been calcified over 10 plus years of inaction and wait for the leopard to go away.

It's a dire situation for a lot of folks. The stakes here are existential. I hate to be so bleak, but it is that way. It's scary. I think that's interesting what you said about how Republican PACs and the Trump campaign itself was successful at positioning these things as in a zero-sum game, taking away from people's economic well-being. And of course, it's easy to do that when the Democratic Party isn't able to communicate any type of economic

vision. And of course, everyone who was a Biden dead-ender this time around has said, okay, well, I hope you enjoy DLC Clintonism for the rest of your fucking life because we tried left-Kensianism and it didn't work. But I feel like I'm fucking repeating myself here. The elephant in the room here seems to be that the president was 82 fucking years old and couldn't communicate any type of economic policy or any policy period. It didn't matter what he did because he just got up there and like clipped through the

floor. It's easy to position these things zero sum when there's just a complete inability to communicate on the other side, whether it is Joe Biden being too fucking old or the Harris campaign that would not commit to a single policy besides Pell grants for people who start a small business in a disadvantaged neighborhood. No, I mean, apropos of nothing else, even the Harris campaign, even Trump's one of Trump's pollsters, Tony Fabricio has acknowledged that these attack ads were not their most effective advertisement. I mean, this

is an advertising strategy that the Harris campaign themselves have said did not decide this election. Right? You have to ask yourself, why are people in the Beltway coming to this conclusion that Harris' support, Democrats' support for trans people somehow cost them in this election. And you come down to essentially they didn't respond so they imply that it was a weakness when their lack of response was because they didn't care beforehand to actually dive into the issue. But then it creates this circle where now a self-fulfilling prophecy has arisen and their support for trans people hurt them in this election like they always knew it would in the end. And so might as well just throw them under the bus because had to happen. get to the heart of it, right? Either they are going to develop a coherent and cohesive message to successfully defend this population from losing the health care that many of them need

to even continue living. Or they will decide it couldn't possibly have been inflation or the 82 year old president or any number of other issues. It couldn't have possibly been those things this, this pass go round. And that is, that is a, you know, what will decide the stakes of that is candidly, uh, whether or not people actually go into the streets and, uh, you know, phone their legislators and ask, tell their families. I mean, that is actually, that is the situation that we are in at this moment.

Well, I want to talk about like this, the sort of contrast between a national message like Trump's they, them, at, which like, maybe the data doesn't bear this out, but like, as you said, it did the work of associating on a national level in people's mind this idea that trans people are this special group and they get health care at your expense. When like, you know, you don't have health care or, you know, your your paychecks going shorter and shorter than ever before.

But then again, like at a local level, when it's like your school board or your governor, these same messages in like state races don't play the same way. What do you think accounts for this disparity between like this sort of vague broad national message and more distinct local or state races? There's no evidence that anti-trans messaging wins elections. In fact, even the pollsters that who even the few pollsters whose work has been misconstrued by people to claim that it hurt Harrison's past election themselves have told me that that's not the case. The issue here is that if you just attack trans people, it comes across bullying.

I myself have reviewed some results from focus groups that were performed for the Heritage Foundation this past year, that show these attacks come across as bullying to swing voters. I mean, this is not a winning strategy. What is a winning strategy is to message on the economy and then say your opponent isn't focused on the economy because they're focused on this other thing. Right. Right?

And like that, like, you know, you could have made that free TVs for prisoners instead of sex changes. And it wouldn't have made the difference. Like if Harris was on TV going, oh, yeah, I think prisoners need free TVs. You know, I remember the 90s cable TV for prisoners was like, like a wedge issue where it was just like, I don't know, they're in prison. They don't have cable TV. They don't have comedy social. But I mean like but I think that's fascinating what you said about like when you're just straight-up attacking trans people it comes across as bullying. Do you think that there is perhaps the beginnings of a message for the Democrats who may be interested in, I don't know,

standing up for trans people there because when this they're like, you know, we turn it out talking about like the denial of health care and like this gets into issues of, you know, like medicine and like you said, like a very specific field of health care. But like, isn't the larger message here that like a denial of trans health care or doing away with trans health care, this is really about doing away with trans people. Like, I mean, how far or leap do you go to get to like the point where like, the message should be about like, hey, they're trying to basically erase trans people, not just their health care, but like one necessarily follows the other. Well, I mean, so there definitely is a message in that, you know, and even in our conversations with

Democratic staffers who describe themselves as more moderate, it's clear that, like, if Democrats do find a message on this, it will be around respect and tolerance. The only issue with that is that it doesn't necessarily message on the certainty that people need this medical care. And that is really at the heart of it or the crux of it is that you're asking these people to overcome personal biases and ignorance. And it's hard to get these people to even retire

or to give up their honorary positions on committees. It, on their own, it will not happen. I, I, I see it in my own eyes. Uh, there was a moment in my reporting where some source told me to my face, the only way that this ban on federal funding to people who perform this care will not happen is if people are dying in the streets. Is if there are waves of suicides. Is if people are marching. That is the only way that this will stop. You're asking the Democratic consulting apparatus to care about a community that doesn't have any lobbyists or very few lobbyists. That is how dire the stakes are.

And obviously for a chapel listeners, right, that's like, of course, they wouldn't care. Well, I mean, you would hope they care, though. Right. I mean, this is this is people dying. But I don't know. I can't answer that question. Well, I mean, like if you if you know, if you were put in charge of, you know, to use the positive America for, messaging on this issue, where is a good place to begin if you were counseling someone who feels, I don't know, a politician in a swing district that feels reticent to talk about this?

I mean, what's a good starting point? I would first of all say that, and your listeners might not like this, but I would say kudos to Jon Favreau for going on the record saying people should oppose this legislation. He didn't have to do that because you know, I'm sure that you and his listeners don't necessarily get along. But, you know, it is worth saying. I don't know. It's not my job to say. I mean, I feel like at some point it should not be one person's job. You know, what would get lawmakers to have messages on this would be if reporters ask them questions. And if the media took our lives as more serious than somehow being a TikTok trend.

I mean, it is a, you can imagine a world where the only way that Democrats find a message on this that not only works, but actually helps persuade the average American person that trans people need this health care to survive and that they should get it without encumbrance is to have people respond to the potential loss of their care the way that people did when we thought that Obamacare was going to get repealed and people were showing up to town halls and on phone calls with office staff going, don't take my health care away. And if that is the message that resonates most, that is a situation where not only are we saying, well, please don't bully people, but actually we're telling people what the science says and what doctors say, which is that this is medically necessary health care. Well, I mean, OK, so if political messaging is quite rightly not your job, it's mine and it's John's job. And we'll be talking about that.

My apologies. I mean to our to like I mean to our listeners who you know be they trans or just simply Have a trans loved one or just friends or just are just concerned about this Like I mean, it's it's a grim picture the portends for the future What would be just your advice to trans people or their friends and loved ones in? Terms of how to deal with what's possibly coming down the pike. This is the time to do something. If you've ever asked yourself, what would I do when this happened for not just myself, but my loved ones?

Now's the time. I've been surprised at how in my own personal life when I tell friends and family about this, the shock, the how, wait, what? How could they do, how could they, how could they? And the processing and then the conclusion and the conversations that come after can be quite helpful. For any trans folks who are listening, you know, you're not alone. Please take care of yourself. If you've listened to this entire thing

and you're feeling really dark and really grim, just talk to your friends and to your loved ones and to anyone who will keep you company in this time. To anyone who was out there who is not trans who wants to stop this care from going away in the United States. You know, now is the time to post that square to your grid. OK, girly, like you can do that. Like, you know, I think that one of the most frustrating things about being trans in America today is all the people who say, I'm sorry, you're dealing with that. And that's not the right way to approach the situation. If I could return to like a broader question,

obviously, like how we got to this point. And you mentioned that like post post the Supreme Court legalizing gay marriage, it did seem like the social conservative movement in this country was like flailing about for like a new wedge issue. And if it's a wedge issue that deals with sex and gender, I mean, like all the better, because those things tend to be what, you know, sort of supercharge people's emotions. But like, what do you think accounts for the relatively speedy rise of the kind of of anti-trans politics in this country and sort of like anti-trans pundits and sort

of focus groups are just anti-trans as a political weapon in this country. Well, thank you for that question. You could write a dissertation on that now. There's a couple of things going on and very little of it has been explained to people in a way that makes any sense. But I'll start with a little anecdote. A few years ago when I was writing for Politico, I went out to the middle of northern Nevada and I went to go cover a protest against the nation's, currently the nation's largest lithium mining project. I write about climate change during the day.

I don't usually write about my own rights for a living. And I went out there to write about this protest because mining is really important and there is some sort of conflict, right? And I'm like, oh, they're doing the dirty mining for climate change. Political likes it, whatever. But the thing I found out there was that the people who were protesting this massive lithium mine happened to be financially tied to one of the nation's most prominent and powerful anti-trans organizations, the Women's Liberation Front.

They're an organization called Deep Green Resistance, and they've been organized by same groups of people. And what I found out there was that the coalition that was opposing this massive lithium mine was very quietly, very secretly dealing with this internal tension about how to have someone within their environmentalist movement who was doing environmentalism for a different reason, because they saw technology and innovation in every way under the thumb of capitalism as being an inherent danger and therefore you need to get rid of that.

And part of that means getting rid of trans people, right, because that's a medical intervention and it somehow portrays the quote unquote laws of nature or whatever. Some people like to say that the anti-trans movement is tied to the anti-gay movement and I think people misconstrue that in part because there are Bible thumbers saying the same things all the time. But what people don't realize is that an equally important, if not more important, aspect of the anti-trans movement is this skepticism of pharmaceutical companies, the kind of skepticism of vaccines, masks,

of overall medications that you find with your RFK juniors and Jordan Petersons of the world. And where that is, is in the rise, right? Because after the COVID-19 lockdown, you found this rapid rise in conspiracies around medicine and around certainty in science and who controls it and what have you. That is what, in my opinion, really would have matched underneath this movement because the language around it is relatively the same. You're hearing that vaccine companies lie about the concoctions they pick up

and it's just to make money, what have you. That's, you know, JD Vance went on Joe Rogan, that's what he said. That's, you know, the pharmaceutical companies are doing this for profit, etc. And so that's a huge part of it. The last thing is that people are not on the streets, right? I mean, you aren't hearing about, you know, anti-trans tea partyists.

That's not a thing. A lot of this is astroturfed through smart PR and focus groups that, you know, reporters who don't know any better go to. And that's how you wind up with stuff like what you see in the New York Times, etc. A lot of it's astroturfed. But in those parts, it's the it's the science skepticism or so than anything else. That's really interesting. I mean, because like, I was going to ask about COVID and the lockdowns, because I think if

this were just a product of the same old sort of evangelical right wing socially conservative, like anti gay, anti sex wing of politics, I don't think it would have found the same kind of purchase. And I'm just like, because of COVID, you're right, like this, this growing sense that people feel that like any intervention from the outside into our bodies is necessarily suspect and evil. And then like on top of that, like, just the idea that like that there is some pure or natural way to live that in a technological society, we have perverted in some evil way. And like, I mean, and that's a message that has like, that, you know, back to the, the confused politics of the guy who shot the

healthcare CEO, it seems like it's like, it's a feeling that transcends typical left and right dichotomies and leads to this kind of prevailing sense of paranoia, not just about other people's and their bodies, but paranoia about one's own body and like, and sort of foreign foreign influences and this idea that we need to be protecting, especially children from these kind of like nefarious outside influences. It's the frogs gaming. I don't like them putting chemicals in the water that turn the friggin frogs gay. Do you understand that?

Ugh, ew, ew, it's crap. No, it is. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has said that himself. When I worked at Axios, I actually interviewed the scientists who did the studies that Alex Jones and RFK Jr. cited to say that atrazine, the pesticide, it was getting to the water and turning all the frogs gay and therefore turning people gay. And I mean, if the scientist says that you're using his work incorrectly and

he's sending the shit out of him, then you're probably not using science right. And unfortunately, there's way too much of frogs gay in the anti-trans movement. And it's a captivating message at a time when Donald Trump wins the popular vote. I'm sure you followed the saga. You mentioned the legislator from Texas, McBride, and the Nancy Mace and her bathroom legislation to turn the congressional bathroom into a no McBride zone. I mean like how do you view what Nancy Mace has done? Nancy Mace, by the way, who at one point earlier in her career co-signed an LGBTQ rights bill,

like what do you make of her intervention in this and just like as indicative of a larger anti-trans politics and like sort of courting a certain kind of backlash, receiving it, and like sort of courting a certain kind of backlash, receiving it and then sort of keeping the wheel going off of that. Oh, sure. First of all, Sarah McBride is from Delaware. Thank God she's not from Texas or else she'd be in a world of hurt right now. Hope you're well, Sarah. The situation with Nancy Mace.

So I used to be a congressional reporter. I was out as trans at the time. That was earlier this year. And another reason I quit my job was because I was pretty confident that after Sarah McBride was gonna be elected that they could just unilaterally ban me from the bathroom, come the next Congress.

And so I was very much expecting this. Nancy Mace was drawn out of her previous district, I think was the situation there. She just kind of molded to the lines that the state legislature in her state drew for her. And so there was a deeper red. And so she just turned up the I hate trans people dial because it helps you win elections out there. What's interesting about the Sarah and Brad thing, so two things, when you talk to people in Congress very quietly about what this did, the Nancy Mase thing, it seems as if that was the smartest thing she could have ever done if she wanted to help Democrats,

help trans people, because all of a sudden instead of it being this very obscure thing that was happening in sports or in bathrooms elsewhere, all of a sudden one of their own was being targeted and you know, if you're a pompous member of Congress and one of your equals is banned from the bathroom. All of a sudden you wonder what could happen to you. That's, that's one thing to note, but the more important thing, and this is what freaked the shit out of me, right. Writing about this story is that you don't see people protesting over this bathroom ban, do you? A bathroom ban is in the U S Congress and it's barely even making waves on social

media. The only one making waves on social media is Nancy Mace with her posts that are, you know, I don't even have words to say them. Um, whoever writes them, I'm sure they have a great time. Um, but the, the, there is no back-osh. There is no, you're not seeing people in the streets saying, why are you banning people from the bathroom anymore? It was not NCAA pulling out of DC or whatever the The heck, the equivalent could be air, right?

You know, the truth is they're gonna get away with it. And that's the problem. The problem is there's this kind of path we're on right now toward a very, very slow unwinding of marginalized groups existence in the United States. And you can kick one of their own out of the bathroom and you still won't see people protesting in the streets. So I hope that saga ends well.

I don't know. I can't tell you what could happen next other than only one side is winning right now. And it's definitely not the people who are gonna die. And on that note, I have a joke. Please. Okay. That was the joke. Oh, the aristocrats.

There is like, I saw people talking about this before the election when like, I would say 60-40 unconventional wisdom was that Kamala was going to win by slightly under 2020 margins. And among some liberals, what I saw was like, if Trump wins this time, you're not going to see a resistance like you did from 2017 to 2020. And I think that like, you know, the resistance as it was called back then was sort of like a historical anomaly.

It took place because there were a lot of like trends in media and electoral politics that like won't necessarily be replaced in a vacuum. This time around, though, I did see these same Democrats say, well, if he wins this time, then there's this sense of fatigue of what the fuck. For them, it's like, well, what the fuck? This guy January 6, we did all these, we had all these cases, and then he fucking won again. And, you know, even before they were saying that they would check out if, if that happened with, you know, as you brought up that there were no protests, that this is the only output we're seeing over the Mason and McBride thing

is output on Nancy Mace's side, you do have to wonder if that's going to be the case with everything over the next four years. That's totally true, and that is exactly why people need to realize all of this is right for disruption. If like a handful of annoyed moms who really really really didn't like Dylan Mulvaney somehow got schools to ban books all over this freaking country, then a handful of

podcast listeners could probably stop me and all my friends from dying. That's true. It's actually possible. You can do it yourself. You can do it at home. You can do it at home. If you want to rely on Democrats right now, these people are struggling. And I, you know, I talked to a lot of folks

who I really love for this story, where I stared into an abyss and I told them that I, my one of their friends, might myself be forced into menopause because of this legislation and you're going to have folks who will still have Democrat consultant brain because they can't leave that. And so it's really just up to us. We're kind of sitting here and we're waiting for some hero to come in and rescue us. But if you go in and talk to them, they'll say, what's the plan? It's yeah you know else is depressing what's up my bank account

sorry this is so sad they're like I had to stop drinking for a while I'm not gonna lie like this is we're on a podcast talking about people dying it's not fun well I guess probably should wrap it up there on that that not fun note. But, you know, like I just just one last time, like, like, are you like any resources or just like people listen to this and don't just want to be depressed? They want to like not just be a passive observer of terror of, you know, things continuing to get worse. I mean, I know you said like you got it's on us.

People should be protesting this. But like other other resources or just any like just just simple advice that you could share. Yeah, just do something. You know, it's we have had social movements in the past that have been dictated by courage. And it's really easy for people to be courageous. I wish I was funnier in this moment, but things really are that bleak. And in truth, you know, if you approach it with that mindset and you liberate yourself from, you know, the thought of what could have been, and you realize what is going to happen and what can still change and what can be avoided. You can do what I've done.

You know, I devoted a month of my life to working a third job to just bring this knowledge to people and it was hard and it was depressing and it put me in a dark place, but it also empowered me and made me feel stronger because knowledge is power and agency is all we can do right now. You're going to have your Jim Clyburns who come out and say that Donald Trump should get a pardon, right? Like there are going to be these people who in this moment just accept whatever Morning Joe tells them. And we have to, we, people who really do care about society's most marginalized, really need to be thinking, what can I do

in this moment to go one step beyond and be more helpful to people and more empathetic to people. And specifically, once again, for any trans people who are listening to this episode and who are feeling really dark about, I don't know, for example, what I'm covering and stuff, just please take care of yourself and remember that life is worth living and it's beautiful and it's better that you're here. Now we're all here because we have each other and we can beat this together. It's just we gotta get off our couches, stop posting into the void and do something. Well along those lines I'd like to close out today's show with another

another small appeal to do something very minor. But I would just like to in conjunction with our friends at Dropsite News, they have been sort of spearheading an appeal to get Palestinian poet Rafat Al-Ariya's book of poetry, if I must die, the poetry and prose of Rafat Al-Ariya. They're trying to get it on the New York Times bestseller list. This is the week to buy the book of which that will be possible. I will include a link in the show description, but obviously we've talked about Rafat on

the show. He has been, you know, was the kind of, I don't know, I think the gateway into this issue for a lot of people, particularly with his humor and his writing on the internet and his assassination was really a kind of a, you know, turning point, at least in my mind, or at least for a lot of people. of people and I just like to join with DropSite News in appealing to our listeners that if you're interested in Rafat's work to buy his book this week and hopefully get it on the bestseller list which will be at least in some small way a fuck you to the people who killed him. So that does it for this episode. Sorry it wasn't a funnier one but let's close things out. I want to thank J.L. Hulsman again. Thank you for your journalism and thank you for the great music you do with Echo Astral. Thank you for the work that you do here on this podcast where we crack jokes and then get really

depressed. The circle of life continues. All right, till next time, everybody. Bye bye. The distance blades are torn to naught The distance blades are torn to naught The distance blades are torn to naught The distance blades are torn to naught