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Editor’s Note: The following essay appeared first City Journal.
Gavin Newsom, a Democratic government in California, has recently surprised many when he labeled transgender-identified male athletes’ participation in women’s sports as “deeply unfair.” The forum, a podcast discussion with Magazine activist Charlie Kirk, was just as impressive as the statement itself.
However, Newsom’s comments were not a totally corrupt rejection of gender ideology. They simply reflect and remain unopposed to new trends within the Democrats, including expressing public skepticism of transgender ideology.
This obvious discrepancy between rhetoric and action is not merely a political convenience. It’s a structural problem. More and more, Democrats are finding themselves in balanced acts. It acknowledges how unpopular the activist class is, but continues to rely on it for fundraising, organizing and mobilizing elections. Unless Democrats can break with their fringes, Republicans will continue to use gender ideology as a party that cannot be trusted to govern competently as a stand-in for the broader Democrat criticism.
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The democratic foundation is not committed to the liberal line on transgender issues. In fact, a January New York Times poll found that over two-thirds of Democrats and over 79% of Americans allowed biological men to compete in female sports. The political risk of disagreement should be clear.
However, when Republicans recently forced Senate votes on a bill banning biological men from women’s athletics, single Democrats were not on a broken rank. Even John Fetterman of Pennsylvania was claimed to be the blue-collar truth storyteller on the left, but he was unsettled. He forked from the party in immigration and Israel, but he tilted the line and cast identified athletes as innocent children caught up in “political mass.” Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin wrote a similar note about “Meet the Press,” saying the issue should be left to the community.
Like Newsom, both Fetterman and Slotkin tried rhetorical hedges, but voted firmly at their party. “Leaving decisions to parents” in the case of medical interventions and “Leaving decisions to the community” in the case of sports have become the standard Democrats to defend positions that most of their voters do not support.
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A modest rejection reveals where true power lies within the Democrats. Elected officials must beat voters every few years, but they rely on the party’s activist class every day. Progressive NGOs, donor networks, and advocacy organizations have a major impact on democratic primary and policy decisions and are not interested in compromising on gender ideology. As a result, elected officials are encouraged to move away from the majority opinion towards ideological purity.
As Ruy Teixeira and John Judis discuss it.”Where did all the Democrats go?“The party’s reliance on educated, activist-oriented elites alienate working class and non-white voters. But for activists, staving off extreme positions is a function, not a bug.
Why do democratic politicians listen? As Francis Lee describes in his book “Unstable Majority: Congress and Perpetual Campaigns,” the narrow, highly competitive nature of modern elections puts both parties in permanent campaign mode and heightens the influence of activist factions. By constantly gaining control of Congress, parties prioritize short-term mobilization over long-term coalition construction. Democrats’ refusal to revise courses is a direct result of this dynamic, even if it is politically costly.
Democrat voters oppose women’s sports men, but most don’t prioritize this issue. They may oppose activists, but when they are with them, they do not punish their own party at the ballot box. Therefore, unmotivated public yields to unmotivated single problem lobby.
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But even when women’s sports aren’t the biggest concern for most Americans, the full lockstep of elected Democrats on gender issues highlights a deeper issue. The party cannot defeat activist fringe. This is especially noticeable in the case of Newsom, where his recent words do not match his actions.
In 2020, Newsom signed the California Transgender Respect, Agent and Dignity Act. California continues to allow men to participate in women’s sports; I’ll fight aggressively The federal government on the issue despite Newsom’s podcast-friendly “fairness” talk.
In his conversation with Kirk, Newsom claimed that no one in his office used the term “Latinx,” but his own past statement proves that it is not.
Republicans not only cared about transgender issues to voters, but also seized Democrats’ gender confusion by using those issues to expose Democrats’ vaster weaknesses. If Democrats don’t stand up to fringe activists on this issue of bipartisan consensus, why trust them with something else?
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Newsom’s nasty half-pivoting is not moderation. It is an attempt to put the deep division of his party into paper. More and more, Democrats are trying to speak like moderates, governing like activists. But politics was about choice, and the Democrats made them. They bet that voters hate Donald Trump.
So it’s not just by hammering Democrats about gender ideology, Republicans, especially the Trump administration, to prove they’re wrong, but also by showing their fundamental capabilities on issues that voters are most interested in.
