GOP senator speaks at transphobic rally where people threatened to kill doctors

White supremacists and Proud Boys joined other far-right politicians, pundits, and protestors at a recent “Rally to End Child Mutilation” in Nashville, Tennessee. Some of the protestors held signs supporting death and violence against doctors who provide gender-affirming care to transgender youth, and a Republican elected official was in attendance.

The rally, held at the city’s War Memorial Plaza on October 21, was organized by conservative podcaster and transphobe Matt Walsh. Walsh spoke at the event alongside Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), state lawmakers like state Sen. Jack Johnson (R) and state Rep. William Lamberth (R), former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard from Hawaii, a lawyer from the anti-LGBTQ hate group Alliance Defending Freedom, and other anti-trans activists. An estimated 1,500 to 3,000 people attended, according to varying media reports.

At the rally, one protester held a sign that said, “Doctors who mutilate children should be killed.” Another held a sign that said, “Mutilate the mutilators.” One protestor told counterprotesters, “No mutilators. Mutilators go home.” Other signs declared “homo sex is sin” and that “hellfire awaits” gay people. One of several Proud Boys flashed a white nationalist hand signal during the event, Media Matters reported.

During his speech, Walsh asked the crowd, “As Tennesseans, do we believe in castrating children? Do we believe in that? Do we believe in drugging and mutilating kids? They believe in it.”

Blackburn and Gabbard and other speakers also repeated Walsh’s claim that gender-affirming care “mutilates” children. Such rhetoric has been used to vilify health centers and has led to bombing and death threats against medical professionals. In reality, gender-affirming surgeries are only rarely performed on trans minors, and genital surgeries are never performed on them.

“Look, you all are happy warrior freedom fighters,” Blackburn said during her speech. “You are not going to let the left get their way with our children.”

Walsh planned the rally after launching a successful campaign targeting…

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