photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Ruby Mae kicks off the Transgender Day of Remembrance Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, at the ECM building near KU.

A common take on this year’s presidential election is that a focus on “boutique” or “exotic” issues such as transgender rights alienated most American voters.

“Americans who identify with a gender other than the one they were born with represent a minuscule part of the population,” syndicated columnist Froma Harrop wrote in her post-mortem of the Democratic election loss, echoing many a pundit.

But to the transgender community gathered in Lawrence Wednesday evening for a candlelit Day of Remembrance, there is nothing “boutique” or “minuscule” about their fundamental desire to live in peace and to enjoy the same rights as every other American.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Area residents fill the ECM building near the KU campus for the annual Transgender Day of Remembrance on Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024.

The national Trans Day of Remembrance has been going on now for a quarter of a century, but Ruby Mae, a speaker at the Lawrence event, told the crowd that this one “hit different.”

“There are many forces pressing us to live in fear, to be invisible, to live in stealth, to be closeted, to be quiet,” she said, referring not only to the recent election but also to a previous onslaught of anti-trans legislation that she expects to increase.

“Over the course of the last several months, I have heard more and more stories of people faced with violences large and small,” she said, as bad actors have cruelly inferred permission from the political climate to degrade trans individuals.

While pronouns, bathrooms and athletics grab the headlines, Wednesday’s event made it clear that the bottom line is life and death, as local residents somberly read off the names of dozens of transgender individuals who’ve lost their lives in the past year, many of them to murder. But it wasn’t just a list of names; it was a slideshow of human faces — strangers from all over the country whose stories seemed achingly familiar to the audience.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Chyna Long, of Wisconsin, is one of the dozens of people honored during a slideshow Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, at the Transgender Day of Remembrance at the ECM building.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Rani Baker, of Oregon, is one of the dozens of people honored during a slideshow Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, at the Transgender Day of Remembrance at the ECM building.

According to the Williams Institute at UCLA Law, 1.6 million people in the U.S. over age 13 identify as transgender, and they are over four times more likely than cisgender people to be victims of violence, including rape and assault.

Since last year’s Transgender Day of Remembrance, at least 36 transgender people — about half of them Black trans women — have died from violence, a slight increase from the 33 identified the previous year by the Human Rights Campaign. But those numbers are likely very low, The Associated Press reports, as the circumstances of many deaths are misreported or the victims are misgendered at the time of death.

If trans issues have been getting discussed a lot in recent years, it’s because the conversations have been long overdue, according to the Trans Lawrence Coalition, members of which spoke Wednesday — and because the rights of trans people have been consistently targeted by dozens of new laws, including here in Kansas, where legislation like Senate Bill 180 has banned transgender people from using the bathrooms and other gender-specific areas associated with their gender identity.

Lawrence officials have repudiated that bill, declaring Lawrence a safe haven, but with Republicans, who campaigned on an agenda widely regarded as fiercely anti-trans, about to control the White House and Congress and with a GOP supermajority in the Kansas Statehouse, the fear was evident Wednesday about what comes next, especially with Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach at the helm. Kobach has made no secret of his disdain for the LGBTQ community, banning trans individuals from changing their gender markers on state-issued identification like driver’s licenses, among other measures.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A participant at the Transgender Day of Remembrance wears a T-shirt from KU’s Student Engagement Center, Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024.

Lawrence PFLAG president Janis Guyot noted to the Journal-World that the nation’s first transgender person elected to Congress, Sarah McBride, of Delaware, has been targeted by her colleagues at the United States Capitol before even being sworn in. McBride, U.S. Speaker Mike Johnson announced Wednesday, will not be allowed to use women’s bathrooms in the Capitol, and Republican Rep. Nancy Mace, of South Carolina, wants that prohibition codified in law to extend to all federal property.

Guyot now fears even more for her trans child’s safety and future, but took a measure of comfort in the dozens of allies who showed up Wednesday.

“2025 is not the end of the world,” one speaker said. “We’re here now, and that’s powerful,” expressing confidence in ultimately “winning the war” despite a litany of lost battles.

Ruby Mae shared that sentiment. For all the stories of fear, violence and repression she has heard, she has also heard “a near overwhelming number of life-affirming experiences,” such as trans friends achieving success in a job or finally having a long-desired surgery.

“We give light to each other,” she told the crowd, urging them to support one another in whatever ways made them “safe.”

The Trans Day of Remembrance “stems from death,” she said, “but, make no mistake, it is about life.”

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A slideshow and bell-ringing honored dozens of people Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, at the Transgender Day of Remembrance at the ECM building.