Republican presidential candidate panders to evangelicals by stoking spurious outrage against Joe Biden after long-established Trans Visibility Day happens to coincide with Easter Sunday
Donald Trump decreed at a “rally” on Tuesday in Wisconsin that November 5 would be Christian Visibility Day, a day on which “when Christians will turn out in numbers that nobody has ever seen before” to vote him back into office.
Trump was responding to the bizarre rumor that President Biden named Easter Sunday “Trans Visibility Day,” a rumor perpetuated by his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, who stated President Biden formally proclaimed the day to commemorate the LGBTQ movement as an insult to Christians.
From The Independent:
Properly known as International Transgender Day of Visibility but often shortened to Trans Visibility Day, the date to recognise members of America’s transgender community was founded by Michigan-based activist Rachel Crandall in 2009 and has taken place on 31 March every year since. This year Easter happened to fall on March 31, and so it coincided with Easter.. During his Good Friday speech, President Biden said:
“On Transgender Day of Visibility, we honour the extraordinary courage and contributions of transgender Americans and reaffirm our nation’s commitment to forming a more perfect union – where all people are created equal and treated equally throughout their lives.. . . I am proud that my administration has stood for justice from the start, working to ensure that the LGBTQI+ community can live openly, in safety, with dignity and respect.”
The Republican has recently been ramping up his efforts to secure the support of the evangelical community, even stooping to selling a “patriotic” edition of the Bible, which saw him justly ridiculed by the late-night hosts and on Saturday Night Live for his audacious hypocrisy.
Mr Trump’s return to the rally stage in Wisconsin, whose state primary he won later that evening, was otherwise dominated by his revival of vicious and decidedly un-Christian, anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Earlier in the afternoon, Mr Trump had also appeared in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where, flanked by law enforcement, he had raved that migrants had “wrecked our country” and referred to them as “animals”, warning that America could “cease to exist” if he loses at the ballot box in November.