Seth Moulton's Anti-Partisan Transgender Policy

On at least one issue, the congressman's approach is pragmatic, not partisan

^{Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.)}

Seth Moulton tried to tell them.

Speaking to the New York Times in the aftermath of the election, the Democratic congressman from Massachusetts delivered a stinging criticism of his own party. “Democrats spend way too much time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest about the challenges many Americans face,” he said. “I have two little girls, I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I’m supposed to be afraid to say that.”

Moulton was alluding to the issue of transgender competitors taking part in women’s sports, a controversy that has raged in recent years. Sixty-nine percent of Americans oppose trans-athletes’ participation in sporting competitions that don’t match their birth gender, according to a 2023 Gallup poll. Only 26% support it.

There’s a reason why this issue was top-of-mind for Moulton when he talked to the Times. Republicans spent almost $215 million during the campaign just on network TV ads attacking Vice President Kamala Harris for her progressive transgender policies, according to Ad Impact, an advertising consulting firm. Millions more were spent on cable, streaming and Internet ads that hit her on the issue.

One such ad, which featured clips of morning show host Charlamagne Tha God reacting to the appearance of a similar ad during an NFL game, was quantitatively determined to be among the most potent campaign spots of 2024, according to Future Forward, a Harris-supporting super PAC. The group released data showing that the ad may have shifted the race as much as 2.7 points in Donald Trump’s favor.

Trump and his allies aired multiple ads on transgender-related issues. One commercial showed Harris telling the National Center for Transgender Equality in 2019 that she supported taxpayer-funded sex change operations for prisoners. Another cited the women’s sports controversy.

But, the Trump spots all ended with the same brutally effective tag line: “Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you.”

Beyond the impact of the direct message, which was that Harris holds positions that most Americans disagree with on this topic, the ads’ carried damaging subtexts. First, that Harris is an extremist with fringe stances. Second, the fact that these kinds of positions are part of her agenda now, when America is still dealing with painfully persistent inflation and millions of people are underwater on their mortgages and credit cards due to high interest rates.

Thus, Rep. Moulton was on sturdy ground in citing a transgender-related matter in trying to explain what went wrong for Democrats. When analysis shows that advertising on the issue may have swung the race by close to three points, and you lost both the popular vote and the decisive electoral college states by less than that amount, pointing out the issue’s relevance would seem logical.

However, reread the final words of the congressman’s admonition. “…But, as a Democrat, I’m supposed to be afraid to say that.”

In a stunning display of collective lack of self-awareness, Democrats wasted zero time in showing the world exactly what Moulton was talking about. Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey accused Moulton of “playing politics with people” and “pick(ing) on vulnerable children.” Steve Kerrigan, the state Democratic party chair, promptly issued a statement declaring that “these comments do not represent the broad view of our party.” Moulton’s own campaign manager resigned in protest.

Reactions from Democratic partisans in Moulton’s district were even more unforgiving. Hundreds of protesters held a rally in in front of his office in his hometown of Salem, MA. Liz Bradt, chair of the Salem Democratic City Committee, called the congressman a “Nazi cooperator.” Salem city councilor Kyle Davis demanded Moulton’s resignation, a call that was echoed by many other party members locally and nationally. Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo and the Salem School Committee released a joint statement that condemned Moulton’s words “in the strongest terms possible.” Other local Democrats began making plans to mount a challenge to Moulton in the 2026 primaries. Political science department chair David Art of nearby Tufts University even announced that his department would no longer set up internships for students in Moulton’s office (although the Tufts administration reversed that decision after it became public).

Yet, as Moulton told MSNBC in a follow-up interview, “the backlash I’ve received proves my point,” adding that Democrats “can’t even have these discussions as a party.” Moulton’s critics are also ignoring the data from Future Forward, which, taken together with the volume of Republican ads on transgender topics, indicates that Moulton was correct to focus on the issue.

But, Moulton wasn’t just right on the politics of the issue. He was also right in his analysis of it. In fact, his approach was almost anti-partisan—even though, as he explained to MSNBC, he was “just speaking authentically, as a dad.” By noting the presence of his daughters on the playing field and himself as a parent watching, Moulton was acknowledging that, just as is true of every other issue, there are multiple stakeholders involved with transgender issues. And through his objective examination of the issue—the anti-partisan approach—Moulton signaled his desire, at least on this matter, to seek solutions, not victory.

Now, Moulton shouldn’t get too much credit for his sudden burst of enlightenment. His bout of introspection was inspired by the beatdown Democrats were served on Election Day.

And he hasn’t promoted the same common-sense approach in considering other transgender issues, such as public lavatory and locker room use policies, language modification (e.g. pronouns, like “they/them”), parental notification policies by schools and youth centers involving parents of trans-identifying minors, and school curriculum/instruction policies pertaining to transgender-related subject matter. All these issues also feature multiple stakeholders beyond just transgender individuals themselves.

But, the partisan way to approach issues is to choose one or more sets of stakeholders, champion all their positions and dismiss everybody else. So, when it comes to issues involving transgender individuals, Democrats’ standard position is to support whatever the trans-community wants, on any issue, and expect everyone else to just accept it, including other people who are affected by the same issues.

Moulton’s only departure from this norm was inspired by concerns about the safety risk to female athletes from potential collisions with trans-athletes. He didn’t address the aspect of the threat to fair competition posed by transwomen’s physical advantages. Nor did he say anything about the compromise of the sanctity of women’s sports, as a space set aside for women.

If the congressman were to apply the same stakeholder-focused lens to all transgender-related issues, he would observe that there is a unifying principle that should guide discourse on not just the athletics participation question, but also the matter of public facilities use. Specifically, there are sensitive dynamics involved in the entrance of individuals who are female only in terms of their gender identity into spaces that are designated for women.

Viewed from a stakeholder-centric perspective, there are four main groups of people who are affected by transpersons having access to women’s spaces: transgender people themselves, family and friends of transgender people, cisgender women, and family and friends of cisgender women.

Transpeople want to be safe physically—yes, they, like cisgender women, also face physical risks in these situations—and safe to be themselves. Family and friends worry about transgender people’s well-being. Cisgender women want to be safe physically and also to feel safe, especially in their most private spaces. Their family and friends care about the cisgender women’s well-being.

If we widen the list of transgender issues to include the others cited above—linguistic changes, parental notification and curriculum/instruction policy—then we can add students, parents, and speakers of English, Spanish and other languages to the stakeholders list. Students want to feel safe and have an education that is free from both political agendas and censorship. Parents want to know their children are safe, their children’s education is agenda-free and that schools won’t try to conceal information from them about their children. And finally, millions of English, Spanish and other language speakers want their native tongues to be respected, especially if the linguistic modifications that are being externally imposed on them stem from an ideology they don’t understand or share.

Providing cooperative, anti-partisan policy solutions to these issues is beyond the scope of this piece. (Although there’s a great book you should check out that lays out some relevant policy recommendations).

But, the point is that, on every issue, progressives side with the trans-community and their allies, and conservatives side with whatever stakeholders they view as opposing progressive transgender policies. And, naturally, the same picking-and-choosing of stakeholders occurs for every other issue too.

It takes an electoral butt-kicking to get partisans to step back and say maybe we should take more people’s concerns into account.

Ask Seth Moulton.

Portions of this post have been adapted from my book The Anti-Partisan Manifesto: How Parties and Partisanism Divide America and How to Shut Them Down. Buy the book here. For the time being, it is only available digitally. To read, download the Kindle app to your phone, your iPad or tablet, your Kindle device or your computer.

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