LGBTQ reporter Katelyn Burns wrote in Politico (“I’m Trans. The 2020 Candidates Don’t Know How to Pander to Me.”) In the article she wrote that during the Democratic debates, none of the Democrats addressed the issue of healthcare for trans men, including abortion rights.
She said that Julian Castro almost did, but he botched it by calling for abortion rights for trans women, which is ridiculous since they are biologically male and can’t get pregnant. None of the other candidates addressed it at all. That’s the problem when your party plays identity politics.
You have too many diverse groups to pander to and if you fail, they might just stay home.
“For most of my life as a trans woman, trans people and our issues have been a source of derision. … So when, during the first debate of the 2020 presidential campaign, Julián Castro responded to a question about abortion by saying that all women, including transgender females, deserve access to a full range of reproductive health care options, it should have been a momentous occasion for a trans community that’s long existed in the shadows,” Burns wrote. “There was just one small problem. Castro fumbled his answer.”
Burns explained that Castro, on the national stage, said: “trans females” instead of “trans men” should have abortion rights.
“‘Trans females,’ as Castro said, refers to trans women who were assigned male at birth. That’s a demographic that doesn’t need access to abortion care. Trans men and nonbinary people who were assigned female at birth, on the other hand, do need reproductive health care access.”
“Labeling them as female is considered misgendering. It’s a basic mistake,” Burns said. “Still, a tweet from Castro further muddied the waters. In it, he said that ‘all women,’ including the trans community, deserve reproductive health access. The tweet misgenders every trans man and many nonbinary people—who would not consider themselves ‘women’—who need those services.”