1. United States
2. Mich.
3. Letter

Stand with transgender people. The 2026 midterms delivered a clear verdict: anti-transgender politics is a losing strategy, and defending trans people costs nothing politically. Republicans and their allies spent nearly $200 million on anti-transgender ads this cycle. What did it buy them? Democrats flipped Texas blue, won Michigan's U.S. Senate race by 6 points with a candidate who refused to hedge on trans issues, and sent a western Montana smokejumper to Congress after he told voters the government has "no business sticking its nose into our personal lives" when it comes to transgender health care. A trans Democrat won a suburban Alabama district that Republicans carried by 16 points just four years ago. Of 160 races tracked with transgender implications, 107 went to the pro-transgender side. This was not a fluke. It was a pattern. The lesson is simple. Abdul El-Sayed said it best when he called the fight over trans people a manufactured "cultural flash point" and won anyway. Victoria Broderick called politicians who talk about trans sports "lazy" and flipped a safe Republican seat in Tennessee. The voters have spoken loudly. There is no political cost to defending transgender people, and there is a real cost to abandoning them. I expect my elected officials to take that lesson seriously and to stand firm against any legislation, budget provision, or executive action that targets transgender people.