Turns Out, Trump’s Attacks on LGBTQ+ People Led to His Downfall

The Human Rights Campaign released new data showing that while the country continues to remain divided on many issues, the march toward equality is moving forward -- even for those who support Trump.

According to HRC's polling, 59 percent of voters supported overturning Trump's ban on trans people serving in the military, while 67 percent supported restoring LGBTQ+ protections that Trump previously eliminated.

Of course, there were a slew of other reasons why voters decided to vote for Biden.

Nearly 45 percent of anti-Trump voters cited the president's attacks on people of color, immigrants, and LGBTQ+ people as their top reason to vote for Joe Biden. Plus, Thirty-seven percent said they opposed Trump because he failed to protect the country during the pandemic, while 33 percent cited his "tweeting, bullying, and un-presidential behavior" as a driving factor.

Meanwhile, 30 percent opposed the president due to his "hostility to the environment and denial of climate change," while 23 percent voted against him because of his "efforts to overturn the Affordable Care Act," which would leave millions uninsured.

Other reasons why people voted blue were because of Trump's effort to pack the courts with conservative judges, his huge tax cut for the wealthy that threatens Social Security and Medicare, and his role in the economic collapse and millions losing their jobs.

Contrastingly, 45 percent of those who voted for Biden say they did so because they think he will do a better job with the pandemic, while 39 percent said they voted for him because he will "stand up for immigrants, people of color, LGBTQ+ people, and others targeted by Trump."

Thirty-four percent voted for Biden because he will "fight for working people and the middle class, not the wealthy and big corporations," while 31 percent say Biden will "lower the cost of health care and protect people with pre-existing conditions."

Research showed that Republicans' attempts to sway people from voting for Biden by falsely claiming that he supports gender confirmation surgeries for children didn't work at all. In fact, that issue ranked last as one of the reasons why voters didn't vote for Biden.

The data also reaffirmed that most Americans support the Equality Act, which if passed would make it illegal to discriminate against LGBTQ+ people in most walks of life. In fact, 50 percent of those who voted for Trump support the Equality Act.

Overall, 70 percent of American voters support the Equality Act while 21 percent oppose it. That's a slight improvement from the 2018 election, which showed that 65 percent of voters supported the Equality Act and 25 percent opposed it. Of course, Biden has vowed to pass the Equality Act in the first 100 days of his term.

HRC also pointed out some discrepancies in the 2020 Edison exit survey that previously suggested 63 percent of LGBTQ+ people voted for Biden while 27 percent voted for Trump. New research shows other exit surveys showed a different outcome.

A post-election survey commissioned by GLAAD with 800 LGBTQ+ voters showed that 81 percent supported Biden. LGBTQ+ voters in HRC's own survey showed that 83 percent of them voted for Biden.

"In this survey of 2020 voters, a huge and growing majority of voters support the Equality Act and support rolling back Trump's attacks on the LGBTQ community," HRC wrote. "Support for the LGBTQ+ community and other marginalized groups played a huge role in Joe Biden's winning majority, competing even with the coronavirus as the top reason to support Joe Biden or oppose Donald Trump."

"Once again, equality voters - a group of voters modelled to support LGBTQ+ issues and a key focus of the Human Rights Campaign's activity this election cycle - along with LGBTQ voters delivered massive margins to pro-equality candidates up and down the ballot," HRC concluded. "A 79 percent majority of equality voters supported Joe Biden for president this year."

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