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christian nationalism
What We Can Learn From Trans People in the Fight for Dignity and Democracy
Given the position of exclusion and criminalization in society, trans people know how to fight and it’s a massive fight that we need to wage right now.
Jun 07, 2025
This year, Pride Month arrives at an especially dire moment for the LGBTQ+ community. Under the second Trump administration, homophobic vitriol and violence are on the rise. On Elon Musk’s X platform, a “deepfake” video of President Donald Trump canceling Pride Month has gone viral. And even as Pride celebrations continue as planned (in many places without as many corporate contributions), the attacks against LGBTQ+ people, especially transgender people, seem to be on steroids. After all, since taking office a second time, Trump has issued executive orders that ban transgender women in sports and transgender troops in the military, while limiting federal recognition to two genders. And his executive actions are only the spear tip of a significantly larger legislative attempt to target and scapegoat transgender people, who make up just over 1% of the U.S. population.
Believe it or not, so far this year, 701 anti-trans bills have been introduced in American legislative bodies at both the state and federal levels. More than $215 million was spent on anti-trans television advertisements during the 2024 election season alone. Now, Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” barely passed by the House and at present in the Senate—which would gut Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and other lifesaving safety-net programs—takes explicit aim at gender-affirming care for Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) patients. If the Senate passes it, the result will be devastating for trans people, who are already twice as likely as the general population to be unemployed and unhoused and four times as likely to live in extreme poverty. It should be no surprise, then, that almost half of transgender adults in this country have already relocated or are considering relocating to more trans-affirming places.
While executive orders, budget cuts, and other attacks threaten all trans and nonbinary people, the most vulnerable are, of course, at greatest risk, including the poor, people of color, the young, the disabled, and the incarcerated. In a recent report, the American Civil Liberties Union offers a horrific insight into this reality:
Some of the most immediate impacts will likely be felt by the more than 2,000 transgender people currently held in federal custody. [One] order specifically calls on the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to ignore the guidelines of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) and enforce a blanket policy forcing transgender women into men’s prisons and detention centers against their will. This puts them at a severely heightened risk of sexual assault and abuse by other incarcerated persons and prison staff. The order also mandates that BOP withdraw critical health care from trans people in federal prison.
The overwhelming majority of anti-trans bills target trans and nonbinary children, youth, and young adults by taking away their sense of safety and belonging in healthcare locations, libraries, schools, sports, and so much more, while only accelerating anti-trans bullying and hate. In fact, according to a study from the Trevor Project, “When states pass anti-transgender laws… suicide attempts among trans and nonbinary youth ages 13 to 17 increased from 7% to 72%.”
It’s important to note that none of this is happening simply because Donald Trump himself is a bigot or because the Republican Party is just deeply cruel. It’s happening because there is a highly connected, well-funded, and strategically positioned Christian nationalist movement pushing forward anti-trans policy and its accompanying social violence.
But in the struggle against religious extremism and political oppression, trans people know what losing strategies look like. Preemptive compliance from the institutions we have often relied upon—including healthcare providers, colleges, and philanthropic foundations—has been a losing strategy. Submission to divide-and-conquer rule, theological idolatry, and biblical distortion, as well as silence from supporters and allies, also loses the day.
Given the position of exclusion and criminalization in society, however, trans people also know how to fight and it’s a massive fight that we need to wage right now. Trans people, who have always had to live with their backs against the wall, are now being joined by those from all walks of life. Indeed, as Trump and the Christian nationalist movement attack everything from decent healthcare to decent housing, more and more people are poised to enter a struggle for survival. In the fight for dignity and democracy, trans people have much to teach everybody.
A History of Resistance
Transgender, nonbinary, and gender-expansive people have long resisted unjust laws, as well as mistreatment and oppression from those in power. The Compton Cafeteria riot in August 1966 sparked transgender activism in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District, years before the Stonewall Uprising. Police violence was common in San Francisco then, and the staff at Compton Cafeteria called the police on poor trans women and drag queens who were harassed, subjected to genitalia checks, and subsequently arrested for crossdressing, which was illegal at the time. Tired of the constant oppression, violence, and harassment, trans women resisted arrest, sparking resistance throughout the Tenderloin district. This led to a picket-line presence at the café, as the establishment continued to ban drag queens and trans women.
Evidence of this early trans resistance was nearly erased from historical memory. Thanks to the work of transgender historian Susan Stryker and other activists and organizers, however, the important legacy of such organizing was confirmed to have indeed occurred.
It could not be more important to invoke this powerful lineage of protest and resistance today, not just for the trans and nonbinary community but for everyone.
Three years later, across the country in New York City, the Stonewall Uprising was led primarily by poor people, particularly poor, gender-expansive folks of color, who faced continual police harassment, violence, and discrimination. The Stonewall Inn, a dingy bar reputedly owned by organized crime and frequented by those in the poor gay and trans community in New York’s West Village, was raided by the police in June 1969. The liberation movement that followed saw heroic activism, organizing, and community care by poor, unhoused trans women who resisted constant erasure and violence from the government (and even from within the gay rights movement). Some of those leaders, including Marsha P. Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, Maxine Feldman, Bobbie Lea Bennett, and Miss Major Griffin Gracy, were as much a part of the movement to end poverty as they were of the gay rights movement.
Both Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera were poor, unhoused trans women and sex workers, as well as organizers advocating for deep social transformation. In 1970, they founded S.T.A.R. (Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries) House where they worked to meet the material and community needs of poor trans youth. They held monthly political education meetings, offering support for queer folks who were arrested and couldn’t pay bail. They provided both jail and street support in tough times, while working to organize poor trans folks into a larger movement for transformational change.
The story of S.T.A.R. House is replete with lessons for anyone committed to resisting political violence, systemic immiseration, and authoritarian-style rule. In their melding of community-care and political activism, Johnson and Rivera successfully modeled ways to organize and build power in the shadow of extreme state repression. They insisted that everyone in their community had a right to live with dignity and that even the most marginalized among them should have a role in all movements for collective liberation. Through their work, they developed and protected a new generation of queer grassroots leaders, at a time when no one else was willing to do so. Theirs was a political ethic rooted in a deep understanding of the classic movement slogan: “When you lift from the bottom, everybody rises.”
Today, 2025 Pride organizers are doubling down on that radical history of protest and resistance. In fact, NYC Pride has made “protest” its theme of the year. As Kazz Alexander, its co-chair, explained:
The challenges we face today, particularly in this political climate, require us to stand together in solidarity. We must support one another, because when the most marginalized among us are granted their rights, all of us benefit. Pride is not merely a celebration of identity—it is a powerful statement of resistance, affirming that justice and equity will ultimately prevail for those who live and love on the margins.
Unholy Attacks on Children, the Poor, and the Vulnerable
It could not be more important to invoke this powerful lineage of protest and resistance today, not just for the trans and nonbinary community but for everyone. In the Trump years, the slew of homophobic and transphobic attacks has been inseparable from the rise of Christian nationalism and religious extremism. In many ways, the contemporary legislative, executive, and judicial attacks on trans and nonbinary people closely parallel a decades-long strategy of the Christian right to politicize abortion access, an issue previously not considered political by a majority of Americans, including a majority of Christians.
An eerie argument about “defending innocent children” is being deployed by Christian nationalists in their war on gender-affirming care, despite overwhelming medical evidence that such care saves young people’s lives. In fact, denying such care is part of a growing Christian nationalist mission to remake this country as an extremist Christian dominion, starting with our children.
For example, Oklahoma Senate Bill 129, introduced in 2023 to ban gender-affirming care to anyone under the age of 26, was named the “Millstone Act.” That title reflected an unsettling, even violent interpretation of Matthew 18:6 in the Bible, falsely asserting that gender-affirming care harms children and insinuating that anyone providing it should have “a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”
In January, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee for Religious Liberty released its annual report, “The State of Religious Liberty in the United States.” It identified five areas of critical concern: immigration, antisemitism, in vitro fertilization mandates, parental choice in education, and scaling back “gender ideology” laws. It directly took up the rhetoric and politics of the soon-to-be-in-office Trump administration on trans rights and more.
Indeed, there is nothing innate or organic about the rise of anti-trans and anti-queer hate in the United States. As the research of Translash Media has made clear, organizations like the National Christian Foundation, the DeVos Family, and the Council for National Policy have been instrumental in funding, developing, and workshopping anti-trans and anti-queer sentiment, policies, and theology. Fundamentalist Protestant organizations like Focus on the Family, the Family Policy Alliance, and the Family Research Council have also been crucial to the launching of the anti-trans movement within the last decade, including the drafting of the first anti-trans legislation at a Summit on Protecting Children from Sexualization conference in 2019.
Such Christian nationalist-fueled attacks aren’t just about hurting the queer community. They are also a key way of wielding supposedly “traditional” values and identities to discipline dissent and nonconformity in Christian ranks as well, while sowing distrust of “the other” in this all-American world of ours. All of this, of course, played out in the 2024 elections, when trans rights were weaponized into a hot-button and divisive issue by the Trump campaign (with only the most half-hearted pushback from the Biden-Harris crew), despite the trans community being such a microscopic minority of the population.
What the Bible Really Says About Gender Justice
Christian nationalists like to weaponize the Bible as a primary way of justifying their attacks on trans and nonbinary people. And yet, like all Christian nationalist theology, theirs is heretical when it comes to actual Christian scriptures and the subject of Jesus’ teachings.
After all, the creation story in Genesis is fully inclusive of God’s greatness—from the creation of light and darkness to the nonbinary sunrises and sunsets in between. It should be a reminder that all of us are created in God’s image. While the anti-trans crew has sought to use the biblical phrase “male and female God created them” from Genesis 1:27 in defense of exclusionary violence, some of the oldest interpretations of that text hold that God created the first human beings to contain both “maleness” and “femaleness” inside one body. Indeed, the Bible repeatedly names third-gender people as important.
If Christian nationalists insist on using the Bible to underwrite their social and political violence, those of us who call ourselves Christians must be willing to defend LGBTQ+ people with fervor and theological rigor.
In Isaiah 56:3-5, for instance, God affirms not only the sanctity but the spiritual importance of people who exist outside of the gender binary, in essence promising LGBTQ+ people, “an everlasting name, a name better than sons and daughters.” The Book of Esther, for instance, identifies no fewer than 10 gender non-conforming people, some of whom are identified as playing a role in assisting Esther’s defense of her people against imperial violence. The Jewish Talmud reflects a similar affirmation of gender diversity, legally recognizing no fewer than seven genders.
This inclusivity carries through to the New Testament and the stories about Jesus as well. In Matthew 19:12, Jesus teaches that there are human beings who exist outside of the gender binary from birth. Acts 8:26-39 explicitly lifts up the spiritual leadership of gender nonconforming people of African descent in the story of the Ethiopian eunuch. In our time, that eunuch would have been far more welcome at the Stonewall Inn than at the Family Research Council’s annual summit.
There are numerous other biblical examples of gender diversity and of Jesus’ celebration of and identification with gender nonconforming people. The point is that if Christian nationalists insist on using the Bible to underwrite their social and political violence, those of us who call ourselves Christians must be willing to defend LGBTQ+ people with fervor and theological rigor.
This is a “Kairos moment” for faith communities that affirm the dignity and rights of LGBTQ+ people—especially trans and nonbinary people. Christian nationalism’s spiritual and political attacks on LGBTQ+ people are also an attack on our deep belief in God’s inclusive love. Isn’t it time, especially in the age of Donald Trump, to leverage our public witness, our pastoral presence, our theological voice, and the power of our institutions in defense of the surviving and thriving of all people?
For too long, religion has been used to attack LGBTQ+ people. Today, Christian nationalists are amassing power by claiming a monopoly on morality. But beneath theological distortions and manipulations exists an untarnished gospel that teaches love, inclusion, diversity, and justice. We must be brave enough to proclaim this gospel for all to hear.
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Split Supreme Court Won't Allow First Religious Public Charter School in US
Although another case could soon come before the high court, the ACLU still welcomed that, for now, "public schools must remain secular and welcome all students, regardless of faith."
May 22, 2025
Public education and First Amendment advocates on Thursday celebrated the U.S. Supreme Court's refusal to allow the nation's first religious public charter school in Oklahoma—even though the outcome of this case doesn't rule out the possibility of another attempt to establish such an institution.
"Requiring states to allow religious public schools would dismantle religious freedom and public education as we know it," Cecillia Wang, national legal director of the ACLU, said in a statement about the 4-4 decison. "Today, a core American constitutional value remains in place: Public schools must remain secular and welcome all students, regardless of faith."
Wang's group and other partners had filed a lawsuit over St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School on behalf of parents, faith leaders, and public school advocates. Her colleague Daniel Mach, director of the ACLU's Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, declared Thursday that "the very idea of a religious public school is a constitutional oxymoron."
The new one-page opinion states that "the judgment is affirmed by an equally divided court," which means the Oklahoma Supreme Court's June 2024 ruling against St. Isidore remains in place. There are nine members of the U.S. Supreme Court, but Justice Amy Coney Barrett—who is part of its right-wing supermajority—recused herself from this case.
"While Justice Barrett did not provide an explanation for her recusal, it may be because she is close friends with Nicole Stelle Garnett, a professor at Notre Dame Law School who was an early adviser for St. Isidore," The New York Timesnoted. "Although justices sometimes provide reasons when they recuse themselves, they are not required to do so."
Law Dork's Chris Geidner warned that "a new challenge not requiring her recusal could easily return to the court in short order—especially now that the court has shown its interest in taking on the issue."
In this case, as Common Dreams reported during oral arguments last month, Chief Justice John Roberts appeared to be the deciding vote. Geidner pointed out Thursday that while it seems most likely that he sided with the three liberals, "even that could have been as much of a vote to put off a decision as a substantive ruling on the matter."
Some groups happy with the outcome in this case also highlighted that the battle is expected to continue.
"This is a crucial, if narrow, win for constitutional principles," Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor said in a statement. "A publicly funded religious charter school would have obliterated the wall of separation between state and church. We're relieved that, at least for now, the First Amendment still means what it says."
"The fight isn't over," Gaylor added. "The forces trying to undermine our public schools and constitutional freedoms are already regrouping. FFRF will continue to defend secular education and the rights of all Americans to be free from government-imposed religion."
Leading teachers unions also weighed in with both an amicus brief submitted to the high court and Thursday statements.
"Educators and parents know that student success depends on more resources in our public schools, not less. Yet for too long, we have seen anti-public education forces attempt to deprive public school students of necessary funding and support," National Education Association president Becky Pringle said Thursday. "We are gratified that the Supreme Court did not take the radical step of upending public education by requiring states to have religious charter schools."
American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten also welcomed that the high court on Thursday let stand the Oklahoma decision, "which correctly upheld the separation of church and state and backed the founders' intention to place religious pluralism over sectarianism."
"We are grateful that it upheld the state's highest court's clear and unambiguous ruling to preserve and nurture the roots of our democracy, not tear up its very foundations," Weingarten said in a statement. "We respect and honor religious education. It should be separate from public schooling."
"Public schools, including public charter schools, are funded by taxpayer dollars because they are dedicated to helping all—not just some—children have a shot at success," she stressed. "They are the bedrock of our democracy, and states have long worked to ensure that they remain secular, open, and accessible to all."
This article has been updated with comment from the National Education Association.
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The Trump Coalition Wants to End Democracy as We Know It
Four groups aim to degrade our one-person-one-vote election system so a few billionaires and certain religious zealots can consolidate their political power.
May 14, 2025
The Trump coalition includes four groups of people:
- The MAGA (“make America great again”) base, mostly rural white men and women;
- A group of Silicon Valley billionaires known as the Paypal Mafia;
- A separate political movement called “religious nationalists”; and
- The Trump crime family itself.
All four groups share one basic aim: to degrade our one-person-one-vote election system so a few billionaires and certain religious zealots can consolidate their political power to eliminate free and fair elections to become even more controlling and richer than they already are.
Here are brief descriptions of the four groups.
1: The MAGA Base: Who Are They?
The hardcore, mostly-rural MAGA base can be understood as an echo of the Confederacy. Philosophically, many of them are the same people who tried to destroy the United States to preserve slavery via the Civil War (1861-1865). In their view, the basic ideas that inspired the founding of the U.S. (1776-1788) are wrong: All humans are not created equal and should not have equal rights under law. In 2022, MAGA believers included about 15% of the U.S. adult population, or about 39 million out of 258 million adults.
The MAGA Base: What Do They Want?
For many MAGA believers, President Donald Trump has been sent by God to make American great again, restoring white power. To many of them, white men naturally should dominate all people of color and all women. To varying degrees, many of them scorn foreigners, the poor, the disabled, the elderly, LGBTQIA people, and anyone they think looks down upon them (the mainstream media, Hollywood, and college types, among others).
White MAGA confederates share a seething resentment that they are losing the power and privilege that they have always taken for granted. Trump is their retribution, and many of them find community by rejoicing in his sadistic cruelty.
Of course, they want to restrict the vote. To achieve that goal, they are working to limit or eliminate the right to “due process” guaranteed in the Constitution, which is a step toward their goal of curbing the authority of the judicial branch of government. They seek freedom—freedom to do whatever they want to whomever they please, and they have made real progress.
2: The Paypal Mafia: Who Are They?
The Paypal Mafia is a loosely-affiliated group of billionaires in California’s Silicon Valley with roots in apartheid South Africa. Nazi-saluting Elon Musk is the most famous of them, though Peter Thiel is likely more influential. Many have become devotees of a man named Curtis Yarvin, a racist and avowed monarchist who believes democracy is unworkable and has failed. Yarvin is friends with Vice President JD Vance, whose political career was launched and funded by Peter Thiel.
The Paypal Mafia: What Do They Want?
The Paypal Mafia wants the U.S. to be run by a king, whom they would call a “CEO” (but which Curtis Yarvin has bluntly called “a dictator”). Seriously. They want the nation run like a corporation because corporations are “efficient” (meaning tightly controlled). Another term for what they want is “techno-fascism.”
This “tech broligarchy” (which reveres unlimited male power) wants to “get government off its back” as it continues to create and sustain gigantic monopolies of dubious legality like Google, Apple, Microsoft, Meta, Paypal, Palantir, and so forth—while they freely explore the profit potential of crypto currencies and artificial intelligence, among other dangerous wild-west technologies. Obviously, they oppose one-person one-vote democracy, which might eventually break up their monopolies and curb their dangerous tech gambles.
3: Religious Nationalists: Who Are They?
Religious nationalism includes a large group of people who share an overwhelming desire for political power to eliminate democracy and who are exploiting religion to achieve that goal.
As Katherine Stewart has shown in two well-researched books, The Power Worshippers and Money, Lies, and God, this is not a religious movement. It is a radical anti-democracy political movement dressed up in religious disguise.
About one-third of U.S. adults (roughly 78 million people) either strongly support (26 million) or partially or moderately support (52 million) religious nationalism. Although they are often called Christian nationalists, their actions and goals have little to do with the teachings of Jesus—feed the hungry, house the homeless, welcome the stranger. None of that.
Christian nationalists are Donald Trump’s largest group of devoted supporters. Two out of three completely or mostly agree that God ordained Trump to win the 2024 election. Without religious nationalist support, Trump would never have become president. So, their wish is his command.
Religious Nationalists: What Do They Want?
As Katherine Stewart has shown, religious nationalists want political power so they can eliminate democracy from the United States. They want to end the separation of church and state; eliminate public education and, in its place, substitute particular religious teachings; ban abortion nationwide and restrict access to birth control; deprive gay people of the right to marry and rescind laws that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation; eliminate no-fault divorce and restore “traditional” family roles in which men dominate; pack the federal judiciary with religious nationalists; allow corporations to discriminate openly against female employees (denying them access to birth control); declare “war” on progressive social policies and on “critical race theory;” end all restrictions on corporate monopolies; cut funding for science; get rid of governmental social safety nets (for example, social security, Medicaid, and food programs) so people will become dependent on churches for their survival; promote a Christian Nation identity in which conservative Christians have a right and a duty to enforce their values, sometimes by force; and of course make it hard or impossible for most people to vote.
Their core mission is to take over America and end democracy. Some of them are well on their way.
4. The Trump Crime Family: Who Are They?
Over the years, many people have compared Donald Trump’s family to a “crime family” and Trump himself to a Mafia godfather, demanding unquestioned loyalty from underbosses, enforcers, and associates.
Trump is always looking for ways to keep his soldiers and associates (in the three groups described above) loyal by giving them some of what they want. Meanwhile his sons, Donald Jr. and Eric, are roaming across the planet making lucrative deals with people who seek privileged access to the President of the United States. Cryptocurrency has made such access simple and secret.
The Trump Crime Family: What Do They Want?
So long as Donald Trump can use his office to acquire gobs of money, push people around, receive endless praise and adoration from his subordinates, and inflict cruel revenge on those who stand in his way, he seems happy. His sons seem satisfied to score a few billion dollars here and there, based on their family ties to the president. At bottom, the family wants to retain power so they and their soldiers and associates can make boatloads more money. This requires modifying election systems so Republicans can win despite the odds against them.
Conclusion
So that, in a nutshell, is the Trump coalition. They all share one goal: to end one-person one-vote democracy. To do that, they first want to disempower the federal judiciary and eliminate the expectation of “due process.” Then, by making it difficult or impossible for large numbers of Americans to vote, they intend to remain in power forever.
It is up to the rest of us to make sure they don’t.
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