Trump uses State of the Union to attack trans right and calls for ban on schools allowing social transitioning
President Donald Trump used a teenage girl’s story to call for a ban on states and schools allowing transgender and nonbinary students to socially transition without parental consent, in what civil rights groups have called “forced outing” that endangers vulnerable children.
Trump singled out the story of a Virginia teenager during his State of the Union address Tuesday to call on Congress to further restrict transgender and nonbinary youth after his administration imposed sweeping bans targeting trans Americans over the last year.
Sage Blair’s mother, Michele, sued the Appomattox County School Board in 2023 over allegations that the district did not disclose information that Sage was identifying as male.
Michele has claimed that the school’s alleged withholding of that information led to Sage running away from home and experiencing abuse. The case is ongoing.
“Surely we can all agree, no state can be allowed to rip children from their parents’ arms and transition them to a new gender against the parents’ will,” Trump said in his remarks. “We must ban it and we must ban it immediately.
Gesturing to Democratic lawmakers who didn’t stand up to applaud him, Trump said: “Look, nobody stands up. These people are crazy. I’m telling you. They’re crazy.”
Michele Blair, who is named in court documents as Sage’s paternal grandmother and adoptive mother, has repeatedly testified in support of “Sage’s Law,” legislation in Virginia that would mandate schools to notify parents if a student identifies as a different gender.
Sage Blair was diagnosed with “severe gender dysphoria” and related symptoms in 2021, according to court filings.
She reported experiencing severe abuse, sexual harassment and threats from schoolmates, which Michele Blair blamed on the school for supporting her gender expression. She accused the school of violating her right to direct Sage’s upbringing.
In August, a federal appeals court upheld a lower court’s dismissal, asserting that “under the facts alleged here, none support a finding that these rights are clearly established under the law.” The panel instead suggested Michele could try to bring a case that the school acted with “deliberate indifference” to threats against Sade under civil rights law.
“I’m just so grateful that a light has been shown on this dark topic because it’s happening to so many children like Sage,” Blair told Fox & Friends after the president’s address.
“[The school] glorified the fact that … she wanted to identify as a boy, and she was being horribly bullied,” she said. “Had things been different, and they called me and brought me in and told me about the bullying, I could have saved her a lifetime of nightmares.”
LGBT+ advocates warn that proposals like Trump’s would forcibly “out” trans and gender nonconfirming children to unsupportive families.
At least six states explicitly require school staff members to notify families when a student has requested to be called by a different name or to use different pronouns, according to LGBT+ advocacy group the Movement Advancement Project.
