In a shameless attempt to both pander to their base and villainize the GOP, MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell and Politico White House correspondent Eugene Daniels have reduced the integrity of women’s sports to “red meat” for the Republican Party.
Daniels took the attack a step further, accusing the GOP of villainizing people and implying that such bills lead to suicides.
Mitchell, while bemoaning the GOP’s refusal to do what the Democratic base and the media want, noted that Republicans had passed a bill banning transgender athletes from participating in women’s sports. Daniels agreed, noting that this was something “Republicans have been doing for months and months, years now, right?”
From there, Daniels shifted to the “activists say” way of reporting, claiming that Republicans were using trans people as “a cudgel and also as the boogeyman and woman of America, right?” While that might be what activists say, there is no evidence to back up such a claim.
He then went on to play the suicide card, claiming that “this is what they were worried about and most importantly, I think they are worried about the numbers, the vast numbers, disproportionate numbers of young trans people who either kill themselves or feel scared living in this country as folks try to pass bills like this.”
What Daniels and Mitchell fail to mention is that the vast majority of people, on both sides of the aisle, support the protection of women’s sports. This is not a Republican issue, it is a human rights issue, and it is an issue that deserves to be taken seriously.
The idea that the GOP is using trans people as a “boogeyman” is outrageous and insulting. It implies that the Republican Party is somehow responsible for trans suicides, which is simply not true. Furthermore, the insinuation that public opinion is not on the GOP’s side is false; polls show that the majority of Americans support protecting women’s sports.
At the end of the day, the integrity of women’s sports should not be reduced to “red meat” for the Republican Party, nor should it be a tool for liberal media outlets to score cheap political points. It is a human rights issue, and it deserves to be treated as such.
Erica Carlin is an independent journalist, opinion writer and contributor to several news and opinion sources. She is based in Georgia.
