President Joe Biden slammed Republican attempts to ban gender-affirming care for transgender people when speaking at a forum with transgender TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney.
Ms Mulvaney has documented her experiences on TikTok about her gender transition.
Ms Mulvaney spoke with the president at a forum for NowThisNews at the White House, where she asked Mr Biden whether he thought states have a right to ban gender-affirming health care.
“I don’t think any state or anybody should have the right to do that as a moral question and as a legal question,” he said. “I just think it’s wrong.”
Mr Biden mentioned his late son, former Delaware attorney general Beau Biden, who passed one of the broadest protections for gender-affirming care.
“Sometimes, they try to block you from being able to access certain medicines, being able to access certain procedures,” he said. “No state should be able to do that in my view.”
Mr Biden’s words come as many Republicans have sought to prohibit gender-affirming care. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin proposed a policy that would require parents sign off on the use of any pronoun or name different from a student’s assigned sex and that the use of facilities and participation in student programming should be based on their biological sex, CBS News reported.
In Texas, Governor Greg Abbott ordered the state’s child welfare agency to report instances of children receiving gender-affirming care as child abuse. The Human Rights Campaign reported more than 300 anti-LGBTQ+ were introduced in state legislatures this year.
Similarly, House Republicans’ proposed “Commitment to America” agenda has a plank that says “Defend fairness by ensuring that only women can compete in women’s sports,” specifically speaking to right-wing anger about transgender women participating in women’s sports.
Mr Biden pushed back on the proposals from Republicans.
“I feel very, very strongly that you should have every single solitary right,” he said, including using the bathroom of the gender of which they align.
Ms Mulvaney followed up by asking about how Republicans haved turned transgender and non-binary people into “this thing to blame society’s downfall,” and said that transgender women of colour are being murdered at an alarming rate.
“How can a Democratic leader be more effective in advocating for people in our family in our lives and opportunities?” she asked.
“People fear what they don’t know,” Mr Biden said. “When people realize, individuals realize ‘oh, this is what they’re telling me to be frightened of, this is the problem, this is,’ I mean, people change their minds.”
Mr Biden said it was important for leaders to speak about the basic fundamental rights of people and the idea that what’s happening in some states is “outrageous and I think it’s immoral.’
“The trans part isn’t immoral,” he said. “What they’re trying to do to trans persons is immoral.”
