A new report reveals that 53 transgender people were killed while 32 were lost to suicide across the US in the last year, which saw a marked increase in anti-trans legislation and rhetoric.
Notably, while these numbers from the National Center for Transgender Equality’s (NCTE) annual remembrance report have grown since last year, some experts say that the real number of lives lost is probably higher due to the difficulties in accurate reporting and data within the trans community.
“It is no coincidence that we are seeing anti-trans violence rise at the same time as we’re seeing anti-trans legislation rise,” said Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, the executive director at the NCTE. “Every year from 2020 to today, we have broken the record … of anti-transgender bills ever introduced.”
Heng-Lehtinen added that as “policy attacks grow, so do the physical attacks”.
“It is because of society sending a signal about whose lives are considered important,” he said.
The annual report, released every November, includes deaths from November 2022 through this month. It includes 53 violent deaths and 56 nonviolent deaths, 32 of which were by suicide. In both categories, trans women comprised the majority of deaths.
“Even though hate crimes overall are decreasing in the United States, they are actually increasing when it comes to hate crimes against transgender people in particular and, even more so, hate crimes against transgender women,” Heng-Lehtinen said.
According to the FBI’s national crime statistics released in October 2023, there was a 32.9% jump in reported hate crimes based on gender identity from the previous year. That jump is reflected in the report, with a disproportionate impact on people of color.
While 64% of nonviolent deaths involved white people, 51% of violent deaths were of Black people, and 21 of the 53 violent deaths were of Black trans women.
Heng-Lehtinen noted that these numbers are “obviously completely out of proportion to the general population” and emblematic of a “horrible storm of transphobia, meeting misogyny, meeting racism”.
NCTE’s list includes 30-year-old Chyna Long, a Black trans choreographer who was killed on 8 October in a residential neighborhood in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
“Once she became who she wanted to be, which is Chyna, she lived in that and every day,” Long’s aunt, Alissa Davenport, told local news station TMJ4. “She lived to be Chyna and she was happy.”
Davenport said the murder “took a piece of our joy”.
“To know this was done to her, they truly don’t understand what they have done to our family,” she told the outlet.
Alongside Long, many other Black trans women on the list were killed in acts of violence. In September, Bre’Asia Bankz was shot to death in Arizona, leaving behind a dog named Tiger whom she loved like “her baby”, according to a GoFundMe page set up by her family to pay for her funeral expenses.
In August, DéVonnie J’Rae Johnson was killed in Los Angeles, where she was receiving gender-affirming medical care. She was an accomplished artist, and her family and friends say she wanted to give back to her community.
In October, A’nee Johnson died in Washington DC after an assault that left her in a street. She was later hit by a passing car.
“I want [people] to remember her for her zeal, her passion and her consistency,” Johnson’s friend Oluwaferanni Olarinde told local Fox affiliate WTTG. “How consistent she was with showing her face and making sure her energy was pure and lively.”
Experts emphasize that the number of trans people killed by violence is almost certainly higher than what the report says.
“It is very difficult to comprehensively identify everyone who’s been attacked like this,” Heng-Lehtinen said.
Those difficulties include obtaining IDs that match a person’s gender identity and being misidentified by surviving family members.
“Many transgender people, especially Black transgender people, are nervous going to the police for help and feel like they can’t report crimes,” he said. “It will be too risky or they won’t be taken seriously … all of that adds up to these cases and instances of violence being underreported.”
Kris Tassone, who is policy counsel for the NCTE and head of the remembrance project, told the Guardian that “despite strides in vital record updates, more comprehensive efforts are needed to ensure accurate representation and recognition”.
While international reporting efforts can be even more difficult, the report includes at least 434 worldwide total deaths of trans people – 336 of which were recorded as violent.
Heng-Lehtinen believes it’s “incredibly important” to draw “attention to the violent deaths of trans people” but that it’s also important to remember that activists are still making progress.
“There’s all these attacks happening, and that is galvanizing trans people and those who love us to get really involved. So people are fighting back,” he said. “They’re going out and doing a rally or testifying in a state legislature or getting other folks involved.”
He points to more transgender candidates running for office at all levels, including the Delaware state senator Sarah McBride, the Nashville city councilor Olivia Hill, and the Montana state representative Zooey Zephyr, as well as increased visibility of trans people in the media – particularly in film.
“There’s a lot of resilience here, and there’s a lot of really, really crucial political organizing happening to turn this tide back,” he said.
The full 2023 remembrance report is available online and features photos, illustrations and memorials.
