#waelex

Checking the PDC website, as we like to do, we see that despite numerous calls for donations, Just Want Privacy hasn’t filed any new donations in the month of March. The filed a C-form on March 22 (the filing deadline) but no new contributions have appeared on the site.

Which again makes us wonder: Who’s paying for all of this hateful campaigning? And hoo boy! There is plenty! 

JWP, the campaign behind I-1552, which would limit which restrooms people can use, has carefully pivoted their messaging in recent weeks due to a firestorm of negative press alleging that they’re exploiting the stories of women to make their anti-trans case. 

Rather than focus on men in dresses, as they did last year and at the beginning of this year’s crusade, the campaign has audaciously adopted the role of Chivalrous heroes, co-opting messaging from feminist movements and generally making the initiative about “the safety of women and girls.”

[Image: JWP screenshot alleging that I-1552 would ‘restore women’s rights’]

Of course, as we’ve stated before, I-1552 is not about “men” entering bathrooms with women and girls. Despite the handful of cherry-picked stories that JWP was shamefully used to make their case, the text of the ballot initiative and the previous actions of the group backing it are clearly designed to limit access to public restrooms for trans people. 

Which is to say: People are currently permitted to use the restroom which fits their gender identity. I-1552 wants to role that back, and determine restroom access by genitalia and chromosomes. 

By conflating two very different things—rape and assault committed by men in women’s restrooms and the need for trans people to be able to use the restroom which best suits them—JWP has ginned up campaign messaging that can act as a rallying cry for people who fundamentally do not understand trans issues. 

Here are some screenshots from their FB page:

This story, especially, is such an upsetting way to get a law passed. And, as a commenter noted, it would probably be a lot more frightening and triggering for this woman, a rape survivor, to be forced to share bathrooms with transmen than it would with transwomen?

The people behind JWP—specifically, Joseph Backholm—have been on a quest to limit the rights of LGBTQ people forever. Even looking at their PAC’s donations can show you that in addition to funding JWP, they fought against R-71, the marriage equality referendum in 2013. 

So like, it’s a little late for them to just now decide they’re all about equality and civil rights when they have a track record of trying to curb civil rights. 

Let's play a Presidents Day quiz with an updated version of Mt. Rushmore! Washington congresspeople Jaime Herrera Beutler, Dan Newhouse and Cathy McMorris Rodgers are all invited to participate.

Quote #1: "I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man."

Which Mt. Rushmore president said it?

Quote #2: "Educate and inform the whole mass of the people. They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty."

Which Mt. Rushmore president said it?

Quote #3: "Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official."

Which Mt. Rushmore president said it?

[Editor's note: We extend a sympathetic "oof" to Jaime Herrera Beutler, Dan Newhouse and Cathy McMorris Rodgers for this quote]

Quote #4: “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”

Which Mt. Rushmore president said it?

[Editor's note: Again, we extend another "oof" to Jaime Herrera Beutler, Dan Newhouse and Cathy McMorris Rodgers]

Quote #5: "You know, it really doesn't matter what [journalists] write, as long as you've got a young and beautiful piece of ass."

Which Mt. Rushmore president said it? No cheating!

Big news!!!

Washington congresspeople Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Jaime Herrera Beutler, and Rep. Dan Newhouse finally found the courage to call out our criminal president for his insane policies, calling them “misguided, shocking and extreme.”

Oh, wait. They were defending taxpayer subsidies for corporations and shippers.