America’s counterterror forces can no longer ignore the threat of extremism motivated by transgender ideology, and President Donald Trump’s new counterterrorism strategy rightly addresses this threat.
The counterterrorism strategy, released Wednesday, outlines three major threats: narcoterrorists and transnational gangs; legacy Islamist terrorists; and violent left-wing extremists, including anarchists and anti-fascists.
That third category includes transgender ideology-motivated extremists.
According to the strategy, America’s counterterrorism efforts will “prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-transgender, and anarchist.”
“Americans have witnessed the politically motivated killings of Christians and conservatives committed by violent left-wing extremists, including the assassination of Charlie Kirk by a radical who espoused extreme transgender ideologies,” the document adds.
It remains unclear whether the FBI will accept the Oversight Project and The Heritage Foundation’s request to use its authority under 18 U.S. Code § 2331 to designate “transgender ideology-inspired violent extremism as domestic terrorism,” but this document may enable that move.
The Trump administration deserves credit for taking this threat seriously, and also for pledging to address these threats “apolitically and founded upon reality-based threat assessments.” While the U.S. will examine left-wing extremism, the document pledges that America’s “counterterrorism powers will not be used to target our fellow Americans who simply disagree with us” in the way the previous administration did.
Most people who identify as transgender likely do not pose a threat to their fellow Americans, but a growing list of attackers either identified as transgender or appear to be motivated by transgender ideology.
Examples of Alleged Transgender-Motivated Violence
Tyler Robinson, 22, who faces murder charges in the September killing of Charlie Kirk, reportedly lived with a boyfriend who identifies as transgender and allegedly told his boyfriend he shot Kirk on his behalf.
In February, Jesse Van Rootselaar, an 18-year-old man who identified as a woman, shot and killed eight in British Columbia, Canada.
Robin Westman, a 23-year-old man identifying as a woman, shot and killed two children at Annunciation Church in Minneapolis in August.
Julia Grace Egler, 16, allegedly shot and killed her mother and her mother’s boyfriend following multiple disputes with her mother about her transgender identity and “misgendering.”
Mia Bailey, a 30-year-old man who identifies as female, shot and killed his parents in June 2024.
Audrey Elizabeth Hale, a 28-year-old woman who identified as male, shot and killed six on March 27, 2023, at a Presbyterian school in Nashville, Tennessee.
On May 7, 2019, Maya “Alec” McKinney, a 16-year-old woman who identifies as male, and her 19-year-old fellow student, Devon Erickson, shot and killed one and injured eight at a school in Highlands Ranch, Colorado.
In June 2024, a judge sentenced Alexia Willie, a man who identifies as a woman, after he confessed to threatening to rape girls in girls’ restrooms, carry out mass shootings at schools, and bomb churches.
Where Does Transgender Violence Come From?
To call the transgender movement radical would be an understatement. This movement not only encourages men and women to adopt a “gender identity” as the opposite sex and to alter their bodies to make them conform to this identity, but it also demands that society accept, and even celebrate, the delusion.
Activist groups such as the Human Rights Campaign not only demand societal acceptance but also demonize dissent as a form of violence against people.
HRC has described the deaths of people identifying as transgender as an “epidemic.” However, the Human Rights Campaign’s own data suggests that these people face a lower homicide risk than other groups, particularly men, women, black, white, and Hispanic people.
This claim represents the fountainhead of a constant stream of hyperbolic transgender rhetoric. For instance, MSNBC columnist Katelyn Burns once described a move to restrict the Frankensteinian treatments of “gender-affirming care” as an act of genocide.
The Department of Health and Human Services has concluded that there is little evidence for positive impacts from transgender medical interventions on minors, but it found many documented harms. A jury awarded a detransitioner $2 million, finding that the medical professionals who carried out sex-rejecting procedures on her were liable for medical malpractice.
The American Society of Plastic Surgeons released a statement recommending against transgender surgery for minors under 19, leading other medical associations to follow suit.
Supporters of these sex-rejecting procedures maintain—with a straight face—that people with gender dysphoria (the painful and persistent identification with the gender opposite one’s sex) cannot prevent themselves from committing suicide if they do not receive these interventions. They then use this argument to demonize any scrutiny of these interventions.
Online influencers who identify as transgender have amassed huge followings, and members of their audiences may find themselves bombarded with exaggerated rhetoric about the “hate” of those who dare to disagree. In fact, the influential Southern Poverty Law Center repeatedly compares conservative Christians who disagree with transgender orthodoxy to the Ku Klux Klan.
If you legitimately believe that there is an “epidemic” of murder against people like you, that opposition to your agenda is a form of “genocide,” and that Christians’ disagreement with transgender identity is fueling this, you might be tempted to lash out.
The Trump administration is right to take this threat seriously, and I hope to hear more about its effort in the coming days.
