Enabling Bullies

During his first two weeks back in office, Donald Trump and his collaborators identified their top priority targets:  trans individuals, immigrants, programs supporting diversity, and foreign aid. 

My brother Warren spent his career at the United States Agency for International Development. Warren and his wife Nadine raised their children overseas. Their plan was to return to the United States this summer after their youngest son graduated from the International High School in Frankfurt. Here is what Warren posted to Facebook this week:

Over 22 years ago I joined the General Counsel's Office at USAID - US Agency for International Development. After eight wonderful years litigating contract claims and protests, I had the opportunity of a lifetime to join the Foreign Service as a Regional Legal Officer. With my family gamely in tow we've had adventures serving our country in Ethiopia, Jordan, Ghana, and now Germany. I've worked with amazing people truly dedicated to helping make the world a better place for everyone. And those efforts have demonstrably made the United States stronger, more secure, and more prosperous.  

USAID has ceased to exist. Not after Congressional debate or due to studies and evidence showing it didn't work and offering a better alternative but because of the whims of the unelected billionaire who is running our country now. The immediate harm is to people in severe poverty across the world. Short term damage is to uprooted families like mine. Long term America will be a weaker, more isolated, less respected, and spiritually poorer nation as a result.

My nephew Fynn came out as trans while Warren’s family was living in Ghana. To facilitate his transition, Fynn moved to Bellingham to live with my parents while finishing high school. Now he lives with my kids and me. Warren and Nadine have been incredibly supportive of their trans child.

Our family checks all of Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s black boxes:   USAID. Trans identity. As a lawyer I’ve advocated for members of marginalized communities, and for years I chaired the state’s nonprofit Initiative for Diversity in the legal profession. My brothers and I grew up as immigrants in Vancouver, although most of us immigrated back to the States. For now.

Several friends recently posted Pastor Martin Niemöller’s poem to Facebook: 

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist

Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist

Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist

Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me

Pastor Niemöller uses the word “they” to refer to the German people, not to Adolf Hitler. The Führer corrupted his compatriots with propaganda that stoked their fear and hatred of the Other. School yard bullies never pick the popular kids as their initial victims. Instead, they target the kids who don’t fit in, because bullies know how to work a crowd.

 

When I became an LGBT rights lawyer three decades ago, the Republican Party was using anti-gay initiatives and “Defense of Marriage” acts to rile up their base and win close elections. Nowadays, open homophobia is no longer welcome in polite society. But the nation’s new leaders can count on visceral bathroom panic over trans folk, and prejudice based on the fiction of dirty Mexican rapist immigrants. Between 2021 and 2023, the percentage of Americans who believe transgender athletes should only be able to play on teams that match their birth gender rose from 62% to a whopping 69%. Foreign aid, immigrants, and diversity efforts are similarly unpopular and misunderstood punching bags. 

 

The Trump/Musk team’s priorities during their twisted honeymoon should come as no surprise. Sadly, their enthusiastic support from MAGA-world is no surprise either.

 

Stand up to bullies.