HRC Article:
WASHINGTON — Last night, President Biden signed the FY25 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) into law, which includes a provision inserted by Speaker Mike Johnson blocking healthcare for the transgender children of military servicemembers. This provision, the first anti-LGBTQ+ federal law enacted since the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996, will rip medically necessary care from the transgender children of thousands of military families – families who make incredible sacrifices in defense of the country each and every day. The last anti-LGBTQ+ federal law that explicitly targeted military servicemembers was Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, which went into effect in 1994.
Biden’s press release:
No service member should have to decide between their family’s health care access and their call to serve our Nation.
Biden made serious progress for unions, consumers, and in antitrust. I’m not putting him up for sainthood, but progress is progress. He was the most progressive president of the last 50 years which, sadly, is a super low bar.
Politics is compromise. Biden is not supreme leader of the United States. He shares power with Republicans. The Republicans will get some wins, and every one of them will be ugly and outrageous. If America wanted to support trans people, they should have elected a Democratic House.
Our Democratic Senate voted overwhelmingly against trans people.
The Senate doesn’t rule any more than the President. The Senate must also compromise with the House. If America doesn’t want Republicans to influence policy, then America has to stop voting for Republicans.
The real question is, why do Republicans choose to use their leverage on this shit? The answer is simple. It allows them to undermine Democrats by splitting the left. Your reaction is the exact reason why trans people just got screwed. You are personally more responsible than anyone in the Senate.
There need to be hard red lines. Human rights are one of these. This bill is literally, without any exaggeration, going to result in several thousand dead children. But the very survival of trans people is “political,” so it’s OK to sacrifice our lives for the sake of political expediency.
A few thousand dead kids is nothing, because deep down, people don’t see trans people as human beings.
I sincerely doubt it. The impact is limited to trans children of active service members who do not have a second parent with health insurance. Furthermore, trans healthcare for kids generally means puberty blockers, not surgeries or other expensive interventions. As far as I can gather, that’s about $5k-$12k per year if insurance pays, and likely lower with self pay discounts. That’s easily doable with a GoFundMe.
None of that is to say it’s OK. I’m just addressing the assertion of thousands of deaths.
Nobody should be thrown under the bus, but political reality in a split government says that someone will be. This gave Republicans the hate fix they so desperately wanted with probably less impact than with any other group. I still agree it sucks, but without knowing what the alternatives were, it’s not rational to assume Democrats just didn’t care to do better.
Compromise is not enthusiastic capitulation, which is what we got. This wasn’t a squeaker. Democrats overwhelmingly voted for this in the senate. The party abandoned trans people and you’re defending them for it.
Well, Democrats’ last word to trans people for the foreseeable future was “we’re doing what Republicans want.” Democrats had an opportunity to do better here.
Because they know that Democrats will break solidarity with any vulnerable minority and then blame anyone who is upset about it, like so:
This is bullshit. Centrists are responsible for their own cowardice and their own complicity. Don’t blame people who are upset because you got everything you wanted.
An overwhelming vote is not the same as an enthusiastic vote. The bill got 100% of the Democratic vote in the executive branch, yet Biden was far from enthusiastic about that provision.
The Democrats had to compromise with Republicans on something, and Republicans choose which issues to compromise on, and which to hold firm to. The Republicans chose trans people, not the Democrats. It’s possible that the Democrats could have offered some other group, but they don’t have the power for it not to screw any vulnerable minority. That bill was never going to arrive at the Senate.
Cowardice and centrism have nothing to do with this bill. I’m the first to agree that Democrats are cowardly centrists, but not in this context. When Democrats have to compromise with Republicans to pass critical legislation, that legislation will definitionally be more “centrist” than the Democrats themselves.
Where cowardly centrism comes into play is in presenting their case to the American people. I absolutely do blame Kamala and her consultants for totally avoiding trans issues in her campaign. But, when the election is done, the country doesn’t operate without compromises with elected Republicans.
I’m not sure why you would assume I got everything I wanted. The trans stuff is just the start of what I don’t like about this funding bill. I also have no doubt that if the Democrats owned both branches that there would still be a lot I don’t like, but I think the trans provision would be gone.
It was unfair of me to say it was your fault that Republicans chose to force the trans issue in this bill. It’s not. It will be your fault when they do it next time though, because you are rewarding them for it.
Yes it is.
He says he isn’t. You give him the benefit of the doubt. You trust him. I do not.
Or capitulation, as in this case.
Because you’re carrying water for a lame duck president whose career is over.
I don’t.
And the next time Democrats throw trans people under the bus, it’ll be your fault for defending them. Not that this isn’t the intended outcome.
My apologies. I should have realized that your just a troll.