(RNS) — On a rainy day last fall, a group of faith leaders from our respective organizations met with elected officials as Congress negotiated must-pass appropriations bills. We talked with Democrats and Republicans alike, some with rifles mounted on their walls. We sat under “Blue Lives Matter” flags, Gadsden “Don’t Tread on Me” flags and anti-gun-control “Come and Take It” flags.
In the days before, a minority of extremist politicians, acting under the banner of religious doctrine, had tacked onto the appropriations package more than 45 amendments that targeted LGBTQ+ people — and, specifically, trans people. We went to Congress to make our position clear: As people of faith, we are moved to fight for trans rights, not despite our religious values but because of them. For us, faith is about love of all people, not a select few.
As on Capitol Hill, statehouses across the country have seen a relentless wave of anti-trans legislation introduced — 658 state bills in 2024 alone. Many trans kids and their families are leaving their home states in fear of the impacts of these laws and the social stigma that arises from them.
Maharat Rori Picker Neiss and her family are one such family. A prominent Jewish community leader in St. Louis, she and her family recently moved out of Missouri due to state laws containing dangerous health care prohibitions and outright bigotry.
The politicians behind these bills falsely claim they are protecting women and children from trans people, citing supposed harms that would come from books that feature trans people, or from “the gender agenda.” Their real goal is simply to forward their own political careers at the expense of their constituents. Eighty-six percent of trans and/or nonbinary youth say that debates and laws that target trans people have a negative impact on them. And anti-trans state laws increased suicide attempts by 72%.
“There is a choice that is coming at national levels to politicize trans lives as a tool to advance people’s political careers,” Picker Neiss said. “And that is what breaks my heart — because people have decided that my family is useful as a political tool.”
Our faith communities see through this cynical and cruel strategy dressed up in the costume of religious values. These are orchestrated, bad-faith attempts to use trans people to generate fear of a community on the margins, people who are unknown and misunderstood and about whom many good-hearted people are more confused than opposed. We have seen this before in our political history: Extreme political movements have fomented fear of people of color, gay men, immigrants and many others. Targeting trans Americans is only the latest manifestation of a long appeal to bigotry as a route to power.
Keshet, which works for the full equality of LGBTQ+ Jews, has heard time and time again from young trans people about how degrading it is to have the fullness of their lives flattened into a single dimension. Some are from Missouri, Florida and Texas, where state governments have prohibited them from living as they are. Others, from New York or California, may not live under the oppression of local laws, but they nonetheless exist in a society that is openly debating their rights and their worth. “This is not an issue,” they say. “It’s my life.”
We refuse to let our neighbors and families be exploited for political gain. We cannot let them be sacrificed to enforce a theocratic agenda that targets and outlaws difference. We know that is not how the majority of Americans, including religious Americans, want to see faith expressed. That is not how democracy should work.
In the face of this threat, we are heartened by coalitions across the country of people of faith stepping up to advocate for trans rights. Those meetings in Congress last fall? They worked. Members of Congress and their staffs were grateful to our interfaith coalition for sharing how our beliefs inform our convictions — and for backing those convictions up with statistics. They listened, they asked questions, and ultimately, enough of them voted no to ensure that 44 of the 45 anti-LGBTQ+ amendments failed.
Yet there is more to be done this election year to stop faith from being used to justify bias. The provisions of Project 2025 — the plan for Christian nationalist control over the federal government and our lives — has made that abundantly clear.
We must not leave love on the table. It is time that people of faith answer the moral call to fight back against laws and social control that diminish and harm trans people. Standing together for trans rights is the right thing to do. And it is certainly the faithful thing to do.
(Idit Klein is president and CEO of Keshet, a national organization that works for LGBTQ+ equality in Jewish life. The Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush, an ordained Baptist minister, is president and CEO of the Interfaith Alliance. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of RNS.)
