Trump Hammered Democrats On Transgender Issues. Now The Party Is At Odds On A Response

After losing the White House and both houses of Congress, Democrats are grappling with how to handle transgender politics and policy following a campaign that featured withering and often misleading GOP attacks on the issue.

There is plenty of second-guessing after President-elect Donald Trump anchored his victory over Vice President Kamala Harris with sweeping promises on the economy and immigration. But Democrats also will not soon forget the punchline in anti-transgender Trump ads that became ubiquitous by Election Day: "Kamala is for they/them President Trump is for you."

"Week by week when that ad hit and stuck and we didn't respond, I think that was the beginning of the end," former Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell said of the 30-second spot that was part of 215 million in anti-transgender advertising by Trump and Republicans, according to tracking firm AdImpact.

"They painted her as something I don't think she is," Rendell said. "They painted her as a far-left liberal."

The fallout leaves some progressive and moderate Democrats struggling between the party's modern identity as a champion of civil rights and its electoral fortunes across swaths of America with whom those attacks resonated.