Republicans in competitive races are leaning into a culture-war closing message, accusing their Democratic opponents of being too extreme when it comes to transgender rights.
GOP groups have spent nearly $70 million on transgender-focused congressional ads this cycle, per AdImpact. It’s a coordinated attempt by Republicans to flip the script on Democrats who present themselves as “Team Normal.”
“The divide in America today is normal versus crazy,” House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) said in Freeland, Mich., this weekend. “It’s crazy to say men should compete against women in sports.”
Nationwide, Republicans are running anti-transgender ads in 10 competitive Senate races and nine swing House districts. GOP groups have spent $64 million on Senate ads on the issue and $4.5 million on House ads.
The Republican strategy: While transgender athletes aren’t a top priority for voters nationwide, the GOP is betting that emphasizing the issue will turn off some independents to Democrats while juicing the Republican base. In toss-up Michigan races, the party is prioritizing ads about transgender issues in schools.
— Rep. John James’ (R-Mich.) campaign is claiming his opponent Carl Marlinga is “backed by extremist groups who want to allow school officials to medicate students so they can change gender and hide it from their parents.”
— Former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) is hammering his Senate opponent, Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), on transgender athletes playing high school sports.
“She voted to allow biological males in women’s sports, men in women’s locker rooms,” Rogers told us. “I’m sorry, that’s not ‘Team Normal.’”
Democratic pushback: Just three Democrats — Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas) and Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-Texas) — are running ads to claim Republicans are lying about their positions. Democrats have only spent $1.6 million on ads on the topic.
“The ads simply aren’t true,” Brown told us this month in Ohio, noting fact-checkers rated the claims as false. “We will answer that it’s not true, we will show the ads are a lie, we will show that my opponent knows they’re a lie.”
Marlinga thought the ad was a “bad Saturday Night Live spoof” when he first viewed James’ attack.
“It’s weird, it’s creepy. It’s something that makes me wonder, ‘Where is his mind that he can create this attack out of nothing?’” Marlinga said of James.
Slotkin told us Republicans were trying to “scare and inflame people” on “something that is happening in a small fraction of schools around the country.”
Most Democrats maintain that transgender issues in schools weren’t a concrete concern they heard from voters.
“When I’m on the doors, people are talking about reproductive freedom, costs and tax cuts, not these culture war issues,” Curtis Hertel, the Democrat running for Slotkin’s open seat, told us.
Here’s some news: The DCCC’s outside legal counsel sent a letter earlier this month to local TV stations in Pennsylvania asking them to not run an ad accusing Democrat candidate Janelle Stelson of supporting tax-payer funded “sex change operations for prisoners.” The letter, which was obtained by Punchbowl News, says Stelson never made that claim and doesn’t support that position.
Stelson is challenging former Freedom Caucus chair Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) in a competitive race. The ad, which ran through Oct. 20, was only a $30,000 ad buy, but Democrats said they needed to call out misinformation.
Yet House Freedom Action, which is responsible for the spot, said they stand by the ad in a letter of their own. HFA appears to be drawing a loose connection to make their claim. The Human Rights Campaign has endorsed Stelson, and the group also supports transgender inmates having access to gender-affirming surgery, the HFA said in its letter.
