Right wing activist Caitlyn Jenner, who is transgender, has blasted Joe Biden for proclaiming Trans Day of Visibility on Easter Sunday – even though the days only coincided by chance.
He reaffirmed his administration’s commitment to transgender rights in a powerful statement, released on Friday (29 March), which denounced ongoing attacks on trans people as “un-American.”
In response to Joe Biden’s statement, Caitlyn Jenner took to X and tweeted: “I am absolutely disgusted that Joe Biden has declared the most Holy of Holy days – a self proclaimed devout Catholic – as Transgender Day of Visibility. The only thing you should be declaring on this day is ‘HE is Risen’.”
Yet again: no one has “decided” to hold Transgender Day of Visibility on Easter Sunday, or “hijacked” Easter, or “stolen” Easter. The former has been held on March 31 every year since 2009, the latter is a moving feast day which can fall on any Sunday between March 22 and April 25.
Jenner was immediately taken to task in the comments, with people practically queueing up to correct her.
One person wrote: “Well seeing as how this has been going on for 9 years and Easter changes every year, you’re a reactionary trying to get any support from grifting.”
Another added: “Don’t weaponise your own stupidity like this. March 31st is TDOV every year, and Google is free.”
Someone else shared an old tweet of Jenner’s, which showed her celebrating Trans Day of Visibility in 2017.
One very succinct comment read, simply: “It’s always March 31st, you flaming asshole,” while many others attempted to remind the right-wing commentator that she is, in fact, trans herself.
Since coming out publicly as trans in 2015, Jenner, 74, has courted controversy for her views on the trans community. Just two weeks ago, the former Olympian turned Fox News commentator said trans women are not “real women” and called for chromosome testing to be brought back in sports.
Others pointed out that Trans Day of Visibility and Easter also coincided in 2019: when Donald Trump was in office, and no one accused Trump of “going woke”.
Jenner is just the latest in a long line of right-wingers who are kicking off online about the date clash and manufacturing outrage – including, funnily enough, Donald Trump.
The Trump campaign has accused Biden of wielding an “assault on the Christian faith” with the proclamation.
Karoline Leavitt, the Trump campaign’s press secretary, released a statement saying: “It is appalling and insulting that Joe Biden’s White House prohibited children from submitting religious egg designs for their Easter Art Event, and formally proclaimed Easter Sunday as ‘Trans Day of Visibility’.”
The comment about religious egg designs was quickly debunked, when White House Deputy Assistant to the President Elizabeth Alexander tweeted to deny the claim.
“*Fyi on all the misleading swirl re White House and Easter: the American Egg Board flyer’s standard non-discrimination language requesting artwork has been used for the last 45 years, across all Dem & Republican Admins—for all WH Easter Egg Rolls —incl previous Administrations,” she wrote on Saturday (30 March).
Earlier in the week, before Biden’s proclamation, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors in Virginia unanimously voted (9-0) to proclaim their support for Transgender Day of Visibility, and that, too, was met with condemnation and ire.
Fox News reported that Stephanie Lundquist-Arora – the Fairfax chapter leader of the Independent Women’s Network, an organisation that works as “a private online forum empowering conservative women to inspire, influence, and impact their communities” – called the decision “reprehensible.”
However, members of the board stuck by their decision. “I’m just very happy that we’re recognising a community that has too often been pushed into the shadows and celebrating yet another community within our diverse tapestry here in Fairfax County,” said Democrat Supervisor Jimmy Bierman.
