Will anti-LGBTQ rhetoric by some in Michigan GOP raise cash, incite base? – MLive.com

September 16, 2022 News Editor

Republican politicians’ use of anti-LGBTQ rhetoric as a form of political attack has repeatedly resurfaced in Michigan this election cycle in an effort to fire up its base and aid in fundraising.

Many, however, are skeptical this will translate to a win at the polls come November.

The latest of these jabs came from Michigan Republican Party Co-Chair Meshawn Maddock on Twitter, who earlier this week referred to U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg as a “weak little girl.”

“We’re so blessed this weak little girl moved to Michigan! Looks like he’s bringing all his California Dreaming here with him,” Maddock tweeted in response to a news clip of Buttigieg interest in California’s effort to ban gas-powered vehicles in the state.

A follow-up statement from her doubled down on the comments, with Maddock saying that she was “never going to back down to the woke leftists trying to destroy this state and our country.”

“This week I was attacked for calling a man weak,” she wrote. “I believe America is desperate for strong leaders and sick and tired of weak leaders.”

But the barb against Buttigieg, given he is a gay man, is more than just a simple verbal jab. Due to the misguided stereotype that all gay men are inherently effeminate or weak, the tweet also veers into anti-gay territory.

Nadine Hubbs, a professor in the Department of Women and Gender Studies at the University of Michigan and the director of the institution’s Lesbian-Gay-Queer Research Initiative, called the move “playground insults” with a secondary purpose.

Pointing to the fervor which grew around the potential repeal of landmark court decisions like the right to gay marriage and contraceptives following the overturning of Roe v. Wade earlier this year, Hubbs said anti-trans and anti-gay barbs could be used to test how deep anti-LGBTQ waters run within the party’s base.

That’s already being seen across the country, she added, with a push to try and ban gender-affirming care for transgender people or keep discussions of gender and sexuality out of the classroom. In Michigan, that’s translated into legislation looking to ban drag queens from schools, despite the fact there is no evidence of this ever occurring, and to bar transgender children from participating in school sports.

“Playground insults have made a big showing since 2016,” she said, “and maybe they are testing to see whether they still work or maybe they haven’t gotten the memo that these playground insults are starting to lose their luster with voters. People are getting sick of it. … But I think, even still, they may be hoping that they can get mileage out of it with their base.”

Maddock is far from the first to engage in such tactics.

From Sen. Mallory McMorrow, D-Royal Oak, being labeled by her colleague as a “groomer” in a fundraising email for supporting the inclusion of transgender children in school sports to Attorney General Dana Nessel being called “Michigan’s Groomer General” by Republican Attorney General candidate Matt DePerno on Twitter over comments related to drag queens, political attacks focused on the LGBTQ community have become more commonplace this election cycle.

There is also an additional component to calling Nessel a “groomer,” which plays even more into anti-gay sentiments given that Michigan’s attorney general is a lesbian. There has been a longstanding effort to label lesbian and gay individuals as child predators, said Hubbs, which first raised its head in the 1970s when popularized with the “Save Our Children” movement spearheaded by singer Anita Bryant.

“We LGBTQ people … we have a long history of being framed as sexual suspects,” Hubbs said. “It’s easy, then, to rouse that aura of suspicion around an LGBTQ politician or public figure because you just splash water on all the old myths and stereotypes.”

As for why the remarks seem to continue to crop up, that’s because there is some appetite for it, says Grassroots Midwest CEO Adrian Hemond. He added that so long as there is a base which appreciates it, such rhetoric will continue.

Hemond referenced DePerno specifically in saying that these attacks are also not without another motive: raising money.

Considering that there are nearly 50 days left until the midterms – and traditional, large-dollar Republican donors like the DeVos family are not giving to conservative candidates in equal measure – there is pressure to small-dollar fundraise.

“A lot of American politics now is, especially on the right, driven by being angry at the correct people,” Hemond said. “And that’s what this is all about: Proving to their base that they’re angry enough at the right people that they should give them money.”

That’s not to say all Republicans have stayed mum on the topic. No sooner had Maddock tweeted about Buttigieg did Republican members in both the House and Senate sound off in social media posts of their own, condemning the behavior.

“When I saw this tweet I was disgusted,” Rep. Jack O’Malley, R-Lake Ann, wrote on Facebook. “I mean we are in an era of name calling and disrespect. It needs to stop. Disagreeing is one thing, but insults and slurs… enough.”

Sen. Wayne Schmidt, R-Traverse City, also posted to Facebook saying that he was “not sure I even recognize the Republican Party of today” and that its members “are better than this.”

“This is not the party I have been a part of my entire political career,” he wrote. “Denigrating slurs and highly personal insults have no space in respectful political discourse. We can disagree on policy without engaging in this type of behavior.”

But Schmidt is a term-limited lawmaker and O’Malley has been enmeshed in Republican politics for a long time, Hemond said, which gives them a position to call out perceived wrongdoings within their party.

“Those are party elites, right?” He said, speaking of Schmidt and O’Malley. “The base of the party, the people that continue to participate in nominating conventions, that give us nominees like Matt DePerno and Kristina Karamo, they like this. … And if you want to raise money from those people, this is how you do it.”

Whether that will occur remains to be seen.

Both Hemond and Hubbs seemed certain the remarks would not be a boon with independent voters, nor would it with portions of their own party, with the former emphasizing that the comments are likely an effort to tap into a fundraising base fueled by fervor.

“They’re not going to fundraise from independents, right? They’re going to fundraise from people who are angry, people who are motivated,” Hemond said. “And the energy in the Republican Party right now is for culture war.”

A request for comment from the Republican Party on Maddock and DePerno’s continued comments were not returned in time for publication.

As for those afflicted by the comments, they have largely seemed unphased.

“I think I’m going to just stay as positive as I can, talk about the work that we’re doing in the office, continue to try to do things that are helpful for the state,” Nessel told MLive when asked about DePerno’s comments earlier this week. “And he can run his campaign the way that he sees fit, and I’m going to run mine the way that I think is appropriate.”

Buttigieg, who was in Michigan Thursday, Sept. 15, made similar comments to a WXYZ reporter while attending the North American International Auto Show this week.

“I’m raising a little girl and little boy, and I’m going to raise them with better values than the chairwoman,” he said. “We need to talk about policy disagreements respectfully.”

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