Southern Queer Newsroom
Recent reporting from Pink News and Erin Reed got a lot of LGBTQ+ people's eyes on the government shutdown now upon us. The reporting has been mired in criticism, and I have a few specific criticisms myself.
Pink News
The Pink News reporting is bad. The author, Amelia Hansford, whose name has since been removed from the article, misread one of Trump's Truth Social posts about ending negotiations. While Trump's post talked about all the "Transgender surgeries for everybody," it also complained about Democrats not hating "illegals" enough. Notably, Trump never demanded Democrats agree to ban all trans health care, despite that being the title of the article. Sometime between September 30 and October 1, Pink News changed the title.
Here is the article headline on September 29 (this was still the same on September 30).
And here is the article headline on October 1.
The text of the article is the exact same. The only thing different is the title. If you are interested in checking, here is the September 29 version, and here is the October 1 version that I saved myself.
This is not good reporting in the slightest. The title play suggests that Pink News was more interested in getting clicks by generating fear than factual reporting, and removing the author's name does not suggest good intentions. If the reasons for the removal were genuine harassment of the author, that was uncalled for. However, if the removal was to dodge responsibility for playing off the fears of a community facing intense persecution, I'm far less sympathetic.
As for the text of the article, it's an average, middling quality post from an organization that isn't known for much else besides that. There's little depth, and using quotes from a Reddit user is not a mark of high standards.
Erin Reed
Erin Reed's article is much better than the one from Pink News, although there are still things I will criticize. Her explanation of the budget bills and continuing resolutions is factual and clear, and she does not mix up the two, nor does she mix up the House and Senate versions of the budget bills being considered. In many cases, the information is in-depth, as she cites specific riders in each budget bill dealing with a specific part of the federal government. The facts are generally on point, and I don't think encouraging sympathetic lawmakers to oppose a CR is bad, since reopening the government without crucial protections for healthcare would see rates skyrocket.
That being said, I think there are areas where she misses the mark. First, there is no citation for "many analysts predict Democrats will end up caving on at least some of their priorities." I don't doubt analysts are saying that—working out a solution will involve some sort of compromise—but I still think finding an analyst to cite would have made it easier to see where the claim is coming from. Considering how often Reed cites her sources, especially in this article, I don't think that would have been difficult to find. Heck, here's a piece from Russell Berman where he makes that argument. (I have no idea whether Berman is reputable or not, this is just an example.)
Second, Reed makes the same mistake as Hansford from PN by claiming Trump would not agree to future meetings if Democrats didn't drop their pro-trans demands. Trump did not say that, and then he chickened out like always and had a meeting on Sept. 30. The Truth Social post both Reed and Hansford cite also made racist anti-immigrant claims, but Democrats have not given up on immigrant rights like Trump "demanded."
Third, I think she overstates the possibility of trans rights being cast aside by the Democratic Party. While the fears are real and very deep in the community, it's important to avoid validating those fears at the cost of existing in a shared reality. Reed brings up the NDAA25 (National Defense Authorization Act, Fiscal Year 2025) multiple times. The military spending bill had provisions stripping gender-affirming care for trans youth from being covered by TRICARE, leaving military families scrambling and advocates like myself furious.
Despite that, there have been successes. During the budget fight in March, Senate Democrats struck out every single anti-trans provision in the continuing resolution by voting to sustain the parliamentarian's challenges as not focused solely on spending. Every single House Democrat is a cosponsor of the Equality Act. The "Actions" section of HR 1015 (stripping healthcare from transgender inmates) include a staggering number of motions by Senate Democrats across June 30 and July 1 to kill the bill, meaning that fight went into the night.
It's not limited to the federal government either. Here in Georgia, House Democrats like Park Cannon and Ruwa Romman were loud this past session in their condemnation, and over 70 walked out of the chamber to protest stripping care from trans inmates. And in Texas, House Democrats made their anger known and held up a floor session for nearly six hours to oppose a bathroom ban.
I do not say this to shill for the Democratic Party – they have a lot of issues, cowardice chief among them. I say this because I think Reed comes to the wrong conclusions about our future. I don't think Democrats have much to lose by conceding on the trans fight, or any fight while the government is shut down. People generally blame Republicans for this shutdown, and why wouldn't they? They control Congress and the White House and still didn't get a budget passed that kept people's health insurance prices from increasing.
There's a lie we tell ourselves that needs to be corrected: Republicans can't be challenged. It's a comforting lie, but it's still a lie.
(I read Dr. Hancox-Li's Democrats Must Embrace War Mindset while writing this and it summed up a lot of feelings I had on the topic, both towards the Democrats and progressive culture. I may only be an activist and writer starting this year, but I've already internalized a lot of what this post is saying. I'd recommend subscribing to Liberal Currents' newsletter or RSS/Atom feed, there's some great writing coming out of there. If you don't use RSS, fix that.)