Rep. Eugene Vindman (D-VA) has apologized after a discussion of his voting record on trans issues with a group of fellow Democrats turned ugly this week.
The congressman, who is up for reelection in November, spent Tuesday evening speaking to Democratic voters in Virginia’s predominantly Republican King George County about what is at stake in the upcoming midterm elections. But during the meeting’s Q&A period, several transgender residents pressed him on his vote for H.R. 2616 earlier this year, The Advocate reports.
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Vindman was one of eight House Democrats who voted in favor of the “Stopping Indoctrination and Protecting Kids Act” in May. The legislation, which passed in the House but has not come up for a vote in the Senate, would require public schools across the country to get parental permission before using the correct names and pronouns for transgender students or risk losing access to federal funding. It would also ban schools from teaching “concepts related to gender ideology.” Critics of the bill say it would force schools to out trans and nonbinary kids to parents who may not be supportive of their identity, potentially putting them at risk.
“How can you one week say, ‘Hey, they’re important to our community,’ and then the next week, vote to out kids?” one transgender woman at Tuesday’s meeting asked Vindman, who has been endorsed by the Human Rights Campaign.
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Vindman said he voted for H.R. 2616 because he is a dad.
“I care deeply about my kids, and that’s what I voted on,” he said.
Several attendees tried to explain how the law would affect transgender young people, cutting them off from potentially supportive teachers and school counselors. One trans woman recounted how she’d come out to a trusted adult at school when she was 15, but after her parents found out, they kicked her out, and she was forced to live on the streets until she joined the Army Reserve at 17. A trans man at the meeting told Vindman that if he’d been able to come out at school without fearing being outed to his parents, he might not have stayed closeted into his 20s.
“I’m going to vote to help the vast majority of people the majority of the time,” Vindman told the crowd, according to the Advocate. “Is it going to help everybody? No.”
He also invited anyone who wanted to continue the discussion to speak to him after the meeting, where he continued to insist that his vote for H.R. 2616 was about “parental rights.”
One woman accused Vindman of not listening to his constituents’ concerns about the bill and of showing his privilege. Another committee member told him he needed “to shut up and listen.” Vindman argued that he’d chosen to continue the conversation, but was being “attacked.” The same committee member reportedly told Vindman to “shut the f**k up.”
“You can’t f**king talk to me that way,” Vindman reportedly responded, before walking away without taking any further questions.
On Wednesday, Vindman sent a statement to the Advocate in which he apologized for his actions at the King George County meeting. “I failed to meet my own high standards, and for that I am sorry. As a leader, I should spend more time listening and less time talking. Last night I failed to do that,” he wrote. “I know that people in our communities are hurting, and I commit to listening to them and fighting for them.”
But trans voters who attended the meeting expressed disappointment in Vindman.
“When your rights are being stepped on, how many times do you get told to call your congressman?” one man said. “So if your congressman is voting for rights that’s against your minority group, you’re supposed to call him? What? How does that make any sense?”
In a letter to Vindman, LGBT+ Democrats of Virginia vice chair and King George Democratic Committee secretary Joseph Gaborow said that the congressman’s actions represent “exactly the kind of behavior that causes Democrats to become disengaged and, ultimately, stay home on Election Day.”
“They simply decide whether they feel heard, respected, and represented,” Gaborow wrote. “As of tonight, I do not know whether I can vote for Congressman Vindman’s reelection.”
Vindman is currently favored to beat Republican opponent Doug Ollivant in the November election, according to the Advocate. But one trans woman told the outlet that she’s frustrated that Vindman ran unopposed in the Democratic primary. She said the choice between the congressman and Ollivant feels like a choice between “callous dismissal and active hatred,” but that she felt she would “have to” vote for Vindman anyway.
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