HomeWorldUS elections: Donald Trump spends millions of dollars on transphobic ads

US elections: Donald Trump spends millions of dollars on transphobic ads

For his campaign, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump invested in transphobic ads. The opportunity to attack his rival Kamala Harris.

A topic that seems to interest American voters little but Donald Trump a lot. The Republican presidential candidate’s campaign team and his supporters spent tens of millions of dollars on anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ advertising, according to the US press.

According to ABCNews, as of October 9, more than $21 million had been spent. That’s nearly a third of the roughly $66 million spent on television advertising.

CBS estimates, for its part, that Donald Trump’s campaign invested more than $19 million in two ads that have aired on television nearly 55,000 times since October 1. His main supporting political action committee, Make America Great Again Inc, reportedly spent more than $1.1 million.

These ads air in all key states and during college football and NFL games. They are even the two most viewed Donald Trump ads during this match, according to the company AdImpact.

Kamala Harris is the subject of an ad

In these spaces, Donald Trump attacks his rival, Kamala Harris, who in 2019 said she supported transgender prisoners’ access to and funding for gender reassignment surgery. “Kamala is for them”, we can read. “Trump is for you.”

The Democratic candidate was questioned again about this issue in mid-October during an interview with Fox News.

“I will uphold the law. And it’s a law that Donald Trump has truly upheld,” he said. “I think, frankly, this Trump campaign ad is a little bit like throwing stones when you live in a glass house.”

“Under the Donald Trump administration, these surgeries were available to people incarcerated in the federal prison system due to medical needs,” Kamala Harris later added, citing a public report.

A Federal Bureau of Prisons document from 2018 – during Donald Trump’s presidency – writes that “medical care” for transgender people could “include pharmaceutical interventions” or even “surgery (if individualized evaluation indicates that the intervention surgical is necessary) possible).

Kamala Harris estimated on Fox News that if the Republican candidate spent so much on these ads it is to “create a feeling of fear among voters, because in reality he does not have any plan for this election focused on the needs of the American people.”

The least important issue of the presidential election for voters

Transgender issues are of little interest to American voters according to a poll conducted by the Gallup Institute. Only 38% of voters said transgender rights were extremely or very important to their vote choice in November. Of the 22 proposed issues, transgender rights are considered the least important in this election. According to this survey, the priority is the economy.

According to Cameron Shelton, a professor of political economy at Claremont McKenna College in California, interviewed by CBS, these political ads generally do not persuade voters but rather confirm pre-existing feelings that could boost turnout.

Republicans are “trying to find an issue where the majority is on their side,” said the latter, who has studied the impact of campaign ads in previous election cycles. “What they’re trying to say is, ‘Hey, forget about those other things we don’t agree on. If I can remind you that you agree with me on transgender rights… So maybe this will leak “.

Donald Trump, who repeated several anti-trans messages during his election campaign, is not the only candidate to use these transphobic ads. The Republican candidates for the Senate elections, which will also take place on November 5, 2024, make a similar bet.

Author: Juliette Brossault
Source: BFM TV

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