John Fetterman suggested that Republicans' messaging around transgender rights may have helped propel the former president back into the White House.During an interview with Semafor published on Friday, Fetterman, a Democrat, was asked about the GOP spending millions of dollars on advertisements attacking transgender rights, which aired in key swing states like Pennsylvania in the weeks leading up to Tuesday's election.The ads often included a clip of Vice President Kamala Harris saying during her 2020 presidential campaign that she supported gender-affirming medical treatment for transgender people in prison. The tagline at the end: "Kamala is for 'they/them.' President Trump is for you."Fetterman, who has been an advocate for the transgender community since being elected to Congress in 2022, told Semafor that while he refuses "to throw members of the gay or trans communities under the bus," the messaging around LGBTQ+ issues may have hurt Democrats this election cycle."[I]t's also true, undeniably, that if someone ran for president in 2020 and pandered to that Squad mentality, or to get likes on Twitter, and they made those kinds of statements about gender, they were going to be pretty hard to defend.
That was going to get weaponized," Fetterman said."And it's undeniable that Republicans created a really powerful message: 'She's for they/them, and Trump is for you,'" the senator added. "That kept hitting again and again and again and again for 10s of millions of dollars.
It had an earworm quality. And I'm not surprised that that resonated."Republicans have ramped up attacks on LGBTQ+ policies in recent years, particularly at the state and local level.
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