The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the nation’s largest LGBTQ rights group, on Monday announced a $15 million investment to reelect President Biden in November and combat escalating anti-transgender rhetoric on the 2024 campaign trail.
The education campaign will cover six key swing states — Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia and Nevada — and will include paid advertising, field efforts and grassroots engagement, the group said Monday in a news release.
Recent polling suggests former President Trump leads Biden in the battleground states that will decide November’s election, though the rivals are tied at 44.8 percent nationally, based on The Hill/Decision Desk HQ’s average of 700 polls pitting the two against each other.
HRC also plans to maintain “a strong ground game” in California, Texas, New York and Delaware, where LGBTQ congressional candidates — including Delaware Democrat Sarah McBride, poised to become the nation’s first openly transgender congresswoman — are on the ballot.
The group on Monday said it estimates there are 75 million “equality voters” — voters who prioritize LGBTQ inclusive policies at the ballot box — this year, up from 62 million in 2022 and 52 million in 2016. A majority of equality voters — 80 percent — are “highly motivated” to vote in November, the group said, citing data from a survey conducted earlier this year, though not all of them are set on Biden.
Twenty-two percent of equality voters said they would vote for a third-party candidate if the election were held today, though roughly half said they would vote for Biden if voting for a third-party candidate would help elect Trump. Around a third of equality voters are at risk of not voting in 2024, HRC said, spelling trouble for Biden, whose victory over Trump in 2020 hinged on LGBTQ support.
Biden’s reelection campaign acknowledged the role LGBTQ people played in determining the last presidential election while announcing a national initiative aimed at mobilizing LGBTQ voters in April. The president often markets himself and his administration as the most pro-LGBTQ in history.
Trump, meanwhile, has promised to enact at least a dozen policies targeting transgender rights as president, including a nationwide ban on transgender student-athletes competing in accordance with their gender identity and a federal law that recognizes only two genders. He has also vowed to punish health care providers who administer gender-affirming medical care to minors and roll back new transgender student protections “on day one” of his presidency.
“Every time [Trump] opens his mouth, it’s a new nightmare that comes out of it,” HRC President Kelley Robinson said Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “We’re talking about a person trying to make his way from the courthouse back into the White House yet again to torment our lives, our communities and our families. When I think about the contrast and choice before us, it is clear it’s not just about two candidates: It’s about two fundamentally different versions of our country that we could be looking at after November.”