Minnesota's Transgender Advocacy and the School Shooting

Minnesota's Democrats have been strong supporters of transgender rights, but now they're trying to distance themselves from the shooter who targeted a Catholic school. The shooter, a 23-year-old man, had expressed his struggles with his transgender identity in a journal he shared online. He wrote about feeling tired of being transgender and feeling like he had been brainwashed into believing he was trans. The shooter's writings suggest that he was deeply troubled and that his identity was unstable. He didn't have a clear motive for the shooting, but he did express antisemitism, support for transgenderism, and hatred for former President Donald Trump in a video before the attack. Minnesota's Democratic leaders have been promoting transgender rights aggressively. In 2023, Governor Tim Walz ordered tampons to be placed in boys' bathrooms, earning him the nickname "Tampon Tim" from Trump. Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan wore a t-shirt with a knife and the slogan "Protect Trans Kids" in 2024. The state's Attorney General issued a "Transgender Rights Fact Sheet" in June, outlining how the state supports and enforces the transgender demand to be treated as members of the opposite sex. The fact sheet also prohibits mental health professionals from contesting teenagers' claims about their so-called gender. Minnesota's Democratic legislators have also funded pro-transgender groups in schools and communities. In May, a pro-transgender group boasted about receiving $1 million from the state legislature to fund training and education for medical professionals to engage in gender-affirming care. But since the shooting, Democrats have been trying to downplay the shooter's transgender identity. Governor Walz described the attack as a "horror" and said there shouldn't be words for such incidents. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey insisted that any examination of the shooter's transgender identity amounts to "hate. " In contrast, centrist conservatives have spotlighted the destabilizing civic and personal chaos promoted by state-backed advocacy for teenage transgenderism. Christopher Rufo said that transgenderism is not a matter of "personal choice" or "live and let live, " but an ideology that has done grave damage to millions of Americans. The state's tolerance for drug use also played a role in motivating the gunman. @memeticsisyphus on X said that the shooter hated life itself as a concept and wanted to spread his misery as far as possible. Gays Against Groomers, which opposes transgenderism, noted that cross-sex hormones combined with mental illness is a seriously deadly combo.