The Republican Party has revved up its anti-LGBTQ agenda in recent years, mostly under the banner of a backlash against trans rights and new trans-inspired gender norms. On Thursday, that renewed animosity appeared to kick into an even higher gear when Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign reposted a video that all but called for the extermination of trans people.
The vile video reflects DeSantis’ campaign strategy — staking out a lane to the right of former President Donald Trump on major culture war issues. It’s unclear if there are any limits on what he’ll do in order to claim that territory.
DeSantis represents the tip of the spear of the right’s overwhelming assault on trans rights.
The video, originally posted by the pro-DeSantis @ProudElephantUS Twitter account, is a kooky, meme-filled clip that speaks in the vernacular of the “extremely online” right-wing set. It starts off by showing clips of Trump making statements in support of the LGBTQ community, such as when he said at the Republican National Convention in 2016 that he would “do everything in my power to protect our LGBTQ citizens,” a statement made weeks after the mass shootings at Pulse Nightclub, a gay club in Orlando. The campaign video also shows another 2016 clip of Trump saying he would be OK with Caitlyn Jenner, a trans former athlete and conservative media personality, using any bathroom in the Trump Tower. (In that interview, Trump had framed North Carolina’s controversial law restricting bathroom access for trans people as economically costly for the state.)
It then pivots to a barrage of images and headlines that portray DeSantis as a ruthless alternative to Trump’s tolerance. While a dark, thumping beat throbs in the background, the video celebrates DeSantis’ zealotry by quoting headlines and clips of pundits criticizing DeSantis, referring to him signing the “most extreme slate of anti-trans laws in modern history” and producing some of the “harshest, most draconian laws that literally threaten trans existence.”
Interspersed among these clips are images of men presumably intended to convey DeSantis’ persona, which include: Christian Bale in the film “American Psycho,” in which he plays an unfeeling sociopath who murders homeless people; Brad Pitt as the warrior Achilles in the film “Troy”; Leonardo DiCaprio as a cocaine-addled, wife-beating Wall Street fraudster in “Wolf of Wall Street”; and the GigaChad meme, a photoshopped depiction of an imperious-looking ultra-muscular man originally associated with incel forums. DeSantis is also at other points likened to an alligator and to the character of Maverick in “Top Gun.”
As some have observed, the funny thing about this video is that stylistically it’s sort of camp, and the emphasis on muscular men alongside a techno beat that could plausibly be heard at a gay club gives it a homoerotic vibe. Chasten Buttigieg, the husband of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, responded to the video by tweeting: “This is actually very gay.”
Unfortunately, the video does have to be taken seriously, and there is zero ambiguity about the message: DeSantis represents the tip of the spear of the right’s overwhelming assault on trans rights.
The first premise of the video, that Trump would be soft on the LGBTQ community, is absurd. It’s true that back when he was first running for president, Trump, like much of the Republican establishment at the time, wasn’t particularly animated by anti-LGBTQ bigotry, seeing gay rights as a settled and non-top-tier issue for conservative voters. But picking up on how the cultural winds have shifted over the years with the anti-trans backlash, Trump has since made it clear he is no friend of the LGBTQ community, a sentiment featured prominently in his 2024 presidential campaign rhetoric. He has pledged to punish doctors who provide gender-affirming care to minors, which he has likened to “child abuse” and “child sexual mutilation.” He’s also pledged to prohibit federal agencies from promoting the concept of gender transition at any age, and promised to create a new credentialing body for teachers that would “promote positive education about the nuclear family, the roles of mothers and fathers and celebrating, rather than erasing, the things that make men and women different.” Trump also casually derides trans people by misgendering them at campaign rallies.
DeSantis’ peddling of the myth that Trump is a tolerant softie on trans people underscores how extreme he is. Like on issues such as immigration or critical race theory, DeSantis systematically wants to outflank Trump from the right. And his laser focus on targeting trans people and the broader LGBTQ community with bigoted policies he’s passed in Florida shows he’s willing to walk the walk.
The flashing images of masculinity that surface in the video are absurd, but also merit close attention. In them we can see DeSantis and his circle’s ideal of masculinity: violent, bullying, morally depraved. We should not lose sight of the madness of a major presidential candidate saying he’s OK with being likened to violent sociopaths when it comes to dealing with the medical rights, civil rights and social acceptance of a small, marginalized community that’s already acutely vulnerable to rising violence. The video does not present a philosophical defense of gender tradition. It celebrates a kind of eliminationist rhetoric — solve the problem by getting rid of it altogether.
The video is extreme enough that even Republican LGBTQ groups like the Log Cabin Republicans have criticized it as having “ventured into homophobic territory.” And even two 2024 White House hopefuls — former New Jersey governor Chris Christie and former Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas — criticized it for going too far. But DeSantis has stood by the video and remains fully in the mainstream of right-wing nationalism. The fact that his video isn’t a threat to his viability in the Republican field should deeply worry us.
