Donald Trump launches chilling attack on trans rights and critical race theory at Waco rally

Holding on to the hope of re-election in 2024, former US president Donald Trump has amped up his anti-trans rhetoric by vowing to crackdown on “transgender insanity”.

Trump used the first rally of his 2024 run for the Republican presidential nomination to reinforce his previous plan to revoke President Biden’s on gender-affirming care for trans children. 

During his almost two-hour speech on Saturday (25 March) in Waco, Texas, Trump called his opposition “radical left maniacs” and stated: “If we don’t win this next election, 2024, I truly think our country is doomed.”

To the crowd’s applause, he stated he would “keep men out of women’s sports” and abolish critical race theory from America’s schools if re-elected. 

“I will immediately sign an executive order to cut federal funding for any school pushing critical race theory, transgender insanity, and other racial, sexual or political content on our children,” he said. 

“They’re mutilating your children,” Trump said in reference to President Biden’s office, and dubbed the Democrats a “repulsive political class”. 

Anti-trans bill sweeping across the US

His callous words follow lawmakers in Kentucky passing an expanded anti-trans bill which targets the rights of vulnerable young trans people in the state.

The bill comes as part of a wave of homophobic and transphobic legislation sweeping the US this year.

According to the HRC, more than 410 anti-LGBTQ+ bills – around 180 of them specifically targeting the trans community – were introduced in statehouses across the country during the first few months of 2023.

In June 2022, Biden signed an executive order designed to protect LGBTQ+ people from the traumatic practice of conversion therapy and an onslaught of discriminatory state legislation targeting trans people.

Despite applause on signing the order, just three months later, an independent United Nations expert went on to urge the Biden administration to further protect LGBTQ+ people amid findings of a “deliberate effort” to “roll back human rights” at state level.

Trump attacks opponents

Trump also used the rally to attack his likely rival for the Republican nomination, Ron DeSantis. 

He said: “I’m not a big fan. Florida has been tremendously successful for many years, long before this guy became governor.”

Taking time to belligerently blast the multiple investigations he faces, Trump accused the Biden administration of orchestrating his criminal prosecution to undermine his 2024 bid for the White House.

“The Biden regime’s weaponisation of law enforcement against their political opponents is something straight out of the Stalinist Russia horror show,” Trump said. 

“From the beginning it’s been one witch hunt and phony investigation after another.”

Trump is being investigated in Manhattan for campaign finance violations following his alleged payment of hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election. 

The Department of Justice is also investigating allegations he hoarded top-secret documents and masterminded a plot seeking to overturn the 2020 election, while a parallel effort by prosecutors in Georgia is also examining his 2020 actions, the Independent reported. 

His comments follow his previous threat of a federal rollback of trans rights if he is reelected in 2024. 

At the time, he promised to ban gender-affirming healthcare for trans youth, go after hospitals that provide such treatments and push for a federal law recognising only two genders.

In January 2022, he promised to ban trans athletes from competing in sports, a move that sent a strong signal of where his campaign was headed. 

Tump’s meandering speech also saw him decry the rise of Lia Thomas, a trans University of Pennsylvania swimmer who, with each stroke, has seen a culture war around trans athletes swirl around her.