Trump Focuses on Trans Youth During State of the Union: "We Must Ban It Immediately"https://www.them.us/story/trump-state-of-the-union-transgender-youth-healthcare-restrictions 🔗Samantha Allen (24 Feb 2026)
Facing plummeting approval ratings and a bombshell report that the Department of Justice withheld allegations made against him from the release of the Epstein files, President Donald Trump used several minutes in the first State of the Union address of his second term to call for further restrictions to the rights of transgender youth.
As special guests, Trump had invited Virginia teenager Sage Blair and her mother Michele, who in 2023 sued the Appomattox County School Board over allegations that the district did not disclose information about Sage identifying as male.
"Surely we can all agree no state can be allowed to rip children from their parents' arms and transition them to a new gender against the parents' will," he concluded, adding, "We must ban it and we must ban it immediately."
Noting that Democrats did not stand up to applaud his calls for further restrictions on trans rights, the president shouted, "These people are crazy, I'm telling you! They're crazy!"
In a statement, Human Rights Campaign national press secretary Brandon Wolf called the move "just the latest attempt from Trump and his fellow MAGA politicians to wrestle away medical freedom from American families and distract from their complete failure to solve this country's pressing issues."
"Health costs are still soaring, families are still paying the taxes from Trump's tariffs, masked federal agents are still terrorizing our streets, and the president is still all over the Epstein files. No amount of transphobic fear mongering will change the reality of the state of our union," Wolf noted.
