Congress
Christina Gagnier’s bid for Congress is about standing up to bullies
Democrat hopes to flip her seat to help her party re-take control of the House
For several election cycles, Democrats have been gunning for California’s 40th Congressional District, a purplish area encompassing inland Orange County and neighboring San Bernardino and Riverside Counties that could help deliver the party control of the House if Republican U.S. Rep. Young Kim is ousted.
Privacy lawyer and former Chino Valley school board member Christina Gagnier spoke with the Washington Blade recently about her campaign for the seat, which draws from years of experience “standing up to bullies” throughout her life and career.
In 2021, she lost her school board seat by voting to defend the LGBTQ community against attacks by groups like Moms for Liberty and the Proud Boys, as well as a policy of forced outing in the district.
At the same time, “despite all the culture war-laden headlines, we created dual immersion programs. We worked on STEM education. We opened new schools. We opened a bioscience academy. We did all these wonderful things that unfortunately didn’t make the headlines, but [it was] the things that parents care about.”
Likewise, she told the Blade, “the issues in this campaign are kitchen table issues. Through Our Schools, USA,” a group that she founded to advance public education, “I’m talking to public school parents every day, and they are worried about being able to buy groceries.”
Gagnier continued, “I just spoke with a mom who took out a loan to buy groceries and supplies for a month because of how they’re getting hit. I’ve talked to business owners who have just lost government contracts and might be going into debt because the government just cut off the contract.”
Here is where the rubber meets the road in terms of how the new administration’s work in Washington is harming the lives of everyday people, she said.
“People are realizing that while Young Kim masquerades as a moderate, she’s voting 100% in lockstep with Mike Johnson’s MAGA majority,” Gagnier said, referring to the Republican House speaker.
“We see families in this district suffering, and they’re contacting their representative, and she’s not doing anything,” she said, adding that constituents are likely to continue suffering as “Donald Trump is cutting funding and doing things that are impacting their day-to-day lives.”
The president and his Republican allies on Capitol Hill are bullying people, Gagnier stressed. About 82,000 people in CA-40 will be harmed by proposed cuts to Medicaid, she said. “The issues in this campaign are kitchen table issues.”
Represented by Republican U.S. Rep. Young Kim since 2021, the district is home to small businesses that provide its “lifeblood,” she said, and the owners of these enterprises are “already feeling the impacts” of “the tariffs” as well as “the cuts coming out of D.C.”
“I speak to veterans who are also business owners, and you know, they’re losing opportunities and support left and right,” Gagnier added.
Additionally, she said, “the other thing that is getting attacked is choice: Families being able to make their own private medical decisions, women being able to have the rights that they should have.”
“I’m putting in the work to make sure that we have the resources and the message and we’re reaching voters so that we can actually flip the seat,” Gagnier said. “So, you know, I think this is absolutely doable.”
CA-40 is the GOP-held seat in California that Donald Trump won by the smallest margin in 2024, and last year Kim defended her seat with 1.5 points less than the margin she won in 2022, despite the rest of the country moving toward the right during that time period.
Looking ahead to the Democratic primary election, “There’s a couple other candidates that have thrown their hat in the ring, but, you know, I’m 100% laser-focused on my campaign, making sure that I’m communicating with our families, our business owners, our veterans, and our seniors, and that I’m doing the work I need to do,” Gagnier said.
Trump is “destroying the Department of Education,” Gagnier said, and he selected a nominee to lead the agency, Linda McMahon, who represents “chaos and destruction.”
The newly confirmed secretary was picked not to “reform the Department of Education,” not to “fix things that might be issues at the Department of Education,” but rather is “coming in to destroy” the agency.
Gagnier said “Trump and Musk are already inside of the Department of Education, gutting it, and the end result of that is already being felt by public school families.” For example, she said, “We work with a lot of special education parents. I have parents that are frightened that their children are no longer going to be able to go to public school because they won’t have resources. That’s not okay.”
“We have teachers that are getting fired already because the grants and programs that come from Department of Education are being taken away,” she continued. “We have really talented educators who love kids, who love helping kids, getting unemployed.”
Returning to her election, Gagnier stressed “this is why this race is so important. We have to flip the house. We have to get in there and make sure that these cuts are stopped and we restore all these valuable funding sources that are impacting families.”
“In flipping the house, what that means is we’re able to restore these programs,” she said. “We’re able to make sure that these protections and funding that’s in place to support America’s families, that they’re reinstituted.”
“Donald Trump is a bully. Donald Trump is not going to stop being a bully. He’s going to keep going in and cutting things that America’s families, that the families of CA-40, rely on,” Gagnier said.
Asked what the Democratic Party writ large should do following last year’s electoral defeat, she said “we need a reset on generally as a party is the way we communicate with everyday people,” which will involve being “better listeners” rather than doing “one-way communication.”
“We need to start listening to voters, not tweeting at them,” Gagnier explained. “We need to make it clear to voters that we respect them, and that’s what I’m doing. I respect them, no matter who they voted for [as] president, I respect them. I’m listening to them. I’m here to advocate for them.”
This focus deviates from the tactics used by her Republican opponent who, Gagnier said, “can’t even take simple votes like supporting same-sex marriage” and whose voting record is no different from U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-Ga.).
“Young Kim has taken an oppositional stance to protecting basic rights, like whether it’s for the LGBTQIA+ community or a woman’s right to choice and to make their own healthcare decisions, she literally has taken an oppositional stance to protecting basic rights,” she added. “We’re going to communicate that, but I think that people need to be aware that her voting record is no different than the rest of the MAGA majority.”
Standing up to bullies
“What keeps parents up at night, families up at night, are prices at the grocery store, not culture wars,” Gagnier said. “And so I’m going to do my part in this campaign to gear my messaging back toward those kitchen table issues.”
By contrast, Republicans like Kim have prioritized trans issues that most parents and constituents in CA-40 do not really care about, she said. “They’re worried about their kids having access to college and career opportunities. When they’re going home at night after working all day, commuting, pick up and drop off, [trans issues] are not the issues that they’re concerned about.”
“I lost a school board seat,” Gagnier said. “And I would do it again and again and again, because I’m going to stand up to bullies, and I was not going to allow those students to be bullied in the school district I represented.”
Nor do other parents approve of kids being bullied in schools, neither theirs nor anyone else’s, she said. “They don’t like kids getting singled out. They don’t like schools being less safe.”
Gagnier added, “we see a lot of noise out there but parents love their public schools, and I think that we need to focus on school safety. And part of this is school safety. If kids at school don’t feel safe going to school, don’t feel safe while they’re at school, and they’re being targeted, that makes the school unsafe for every other kid, too.”
The bioscience academy she helped to spearhead as a school board member is a “four-year program for high school students” that — “in addition to the regular things high school kids have in the classroom” — affords them the opportunity to explore “careers in bioscience, biotechnology, the medical field, engineering.”
Gagnier continued, “So it just really gives these kids this very career-technical education focused exposure to these fields. And I’m very proud that we launched that program while I was on the school board, and families love the program, and so I’m just so blessed that we were able to provide that for the students and their families.”
Congress
McBride, other US lawmakers travel to Denmark
Trump’s demand for Greenland’s annexation overshadowed trip
Delaware Congresswoman Sarah McBride is among the 11 members of Congress who traveled to Denmark over the past weekend amid President Donald Trump’s continued calls for the U.S. to take control of Greenland.
McBride, the first openly transgender person elected to Congress, traveled to Copenhagen, the Danish capital, with U.S. Sens. Chris Coons (D-Del.), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and U.S. Reps. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), Don Bacon (R-Neb.), and Sarah Jacobs (D-Calif.). The lawmakers met with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenlandic MP Pipaluk Lynge, among others.
“I’m grateful to Sen. Coons for his leadership in bringing together a bipartisan, bicameral delegation to reaffirm our support in Congress for our NATO ally, Denmark,” said McBride in a press release that detailed the trip. “Delaware understands that our security and prosperity depend on strong partnerships rooted in mutual respect, sovereignty, and self-determination. At a time of growing global instability, this trip could not be more poignant.”
Greenland is a self-governing territory of Denmark with a population of less than 60,000 people. Trump maintains the U.S. needs to control the mineral-rich island in the Arctic Ocean between Europe and North America because of national security.
The Associated Press notes thousands of people on Saturday in Nuuk, the Greenlandic capital, protested against Trump. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is among those who have criticized Trump over his suggestion the U.S. would impose tariffs against countries that do not support U.S. annexation of Greenland.
A poll that Sermitsiaq, a Greenlandic newspaper, and Berlingske, a Danish newspaper, commissioned last January indicates 85 percent do not want Greenland to become part of the U.S. The pro-independence Demokraatit party won parliamentary elections that took place on March 12, 2025.
“At this critical juncture for our countries, our message was clear as members of Congress: we value the U.S.-Denmark partnership, the NATO alliance, and the right of Greenlanders to self-determination,” said McBride on Sunday in a Facebook post that contained pictures of her and her fellow lawmakers meeting with their Danish and Greenlandic counterparts.
Congress
Van Hollen speaks at ‘ICE Out for Good’ protest in D.C.
ICE agent killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis on Jan. 7
U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) is among those who spoke at an “ICE Out for Good” protest that took place outside U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s headquarters in D.C. on Tuesday.
The protest took place six days after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis.
Good left behind her wife and three children.
(Video by Michael K. Lavers)
Congress
Advocates say MTG bill threatens trans youth, families, and doctors
The “Protect Children’s Innocence” Act passed in the House
Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has a long history of targeting the transgender community as part of her political agenda. Now, after announcing her resignation from the U.S. House of Representatives, attempting to take away trans rights may be the last thing she does in her official capacity.
The proposed legislation, dubbed “Protect Children’s Innocence Act” is among the most extreme anti-trans measures to move through Congress. It would put doctors in jail for up to 10 years if they provide gender-affirming care to minors — including prescribing hormone replacement therapy to adolescents or puberty blockers to younger children. The bill also aims to halt gender-affirming surgeries for minors, though those procedures are rare.
Greene herself described the bill on X, saying if passed, “it would make it a Class C felony to trans a child under 18.”
According to KFF, a nonpartisan source for health policy research, polling, and journalism, 27 states have enacted policies limiting youth access to gender-affirming care. Roughly half of all trans youth ages 13–17 live in a state with such restrictions, and 24 states impose professional or legal penalties on health care practitioners who provide that care.
Greene has repeatedly introduced the bill since 2021, the year she entered Congress, but it failed to advance. Now, in exchange for her support for the National Defense Authorization Act, the legislation reached the House floor for the first time.
According to the 19th, U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.), the first trans member of Congress, rebuked Republicans on the Capitol steps Wednesday for advancing anti-trans legislation while allowing Affordable Care Act tax credits to expire — a move expected to raise health care costs for millions of Americans.
“They would rather have us focus in and debate a misunderstood and vulnerable one percent of the population, instead of focusing in on the fact that they are raiding everyone’s health care,” McBride said. “They are obsessed with trans people … they are consumed with this.”
Polling suggests the public largely opposes criminalizing gender-affirming care.
A recent survey by the Human Rights Campaign and Global Strategy Group found that 73 percent of voters in U.S. House battleground districts oppose laws that would jail doctors or parents for providing transition-related care. Additionally, 77 percent oppose forcing trans people off medically recommended medication. Nearly seven in 10 Americans said politicians are not informed enough to make decisions about medical care for trans youth.
The bill passed the House and now heads to the U.S. Senate for further consideration.
According to reporting by Erin Reed of Erin In The Morning, three Democrats — U.S. Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez of Texas and Don Davis of North Carolina — crossed party lines to vote in favor of the felony ban, joining 213 Republicans. A total of 207 Democrats voted against the bill, while three lawmakers from both parties abstained.
Advocates and lawmakers warned the bill is dangerous and unprecedented during a multi-organizational press call Tuesday. Leaders from the Human Rights Campaign and the Trevor Project joined U.S. Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.), Dr. Kenneth Haller, and parents of trans youth to discuss the potential impact of restrictive policies like Greene’s — particularly in contrast to President Donald Trump’s leniency toward certain criminals, with more than 1,500 pardons issued this year.
“Our MAGA GOP government has pardoned drug traffickers. They’ve pardoned people who tried to overthrow the government on January 6, but now they want to put pediatricians and parents into a jail cell for caring for their kids,” said Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson. “No one asked for Marjorie Taylor Greene or Dan Crenshaw or any politician to be in their doctor’s office, and they should mind their own business.”
Balint, co-chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, questioned why medical decisions are being made by lawmakers with no clinical expertise.
“Parents and doctors already have to worry about state laws banning care for their kids, and this bill would introduce the risk of federal criminal prosecution,” Balint said. “We’re talking about jail time. We’re talking about locking people up for basic medical care, care that is evidence-based, age-appropriate and life-saving.”
“These are decisions that should be made by doctors and parents and those kids that need this gender-affirming care, not certainly by Marjorie Taylor Greene.”
Haller, an emeritus professor of pediatrics at St. Louis University School of Medicine, described the legislation as rooted in ideology rather than medicine.
“It is not science, it is just blind ideology,” Haller said.
“The doctor tells you that as parents, as well as the doctor themselves, could be convicted of a felony and be sentenced up to 10 years in prison just for pursuing a course of action that will give your child their only chance for a happy and healthy future,” he added. “It is not in the state’s best interests, and certainly not in the interests of us, the citizens of this country, to interfere with medical decisions that people make about their own bodies and their own lives.”
Haller’s sentiment is echoed by doctors across the country.
The American Medical Association, the nation’s largest organization that represents doctors across the country in various parts of medicine has a longstanding support for gender-affirming care.
“The AMA supports public and private health insurance coverage for treatment of gender dysphoria and opposes the denial of health insurance based on sexual orientation or gender identity,” their website reads.
Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, senior vice president of public engagement campaigns at the Trevor Project, agreed.
“In Marjorie Taylor Greene’s bill [it] even goes so far as to criminalize and throw a parent in jail for this,” Heng-Lehtinen said. “Medical decisions should be between patients, families, and their doctors.”
Rachel Gonzalez, a parent of a transgender teen and LGBTQ advocate, said the bill would harm families trying to act in their children’s best interests.
“No politician should be in any doctor’s office or in our living room making private health care decisions — especially not Marjorie Taylor Greene,” Gonzalez said. “My daughter and no trans youth should ever be used as a political pawn.”
Other LGBTQ rights activists also condemned the legislation.
Tyler Hack, executive director of the Christopher Street Project, called the bill “an abominable attack on the transgender community.”
“Marjorie Taylor Greene’s last-ditch effort to bring her 3-times failed bill to a vote is an abominable attack on the transgender community and further cements a Congressional career defined by hate and bigotry,” they said. “We are counting down the days until she’s off Capitol Hill — but as the bill goes to the floor this week, our leaders must stand up one last time to her BS and protect the safety of queer kids and medical providers. Full stop.”
Hack added that “healthcare is a right, not a privilege” in the U.S., and this attack on trans healthcare is an attack on queer rights altogether.
“Marjorie Taylor Greene has no place in deciding what care is necessary,” Hack added. “This is another attempt to legislate trans and queer people out of existence while peddling an agenda rooted in pseudoscience and extremism.”
U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, also denounced the legislation.
“This bill is the most extreme anti-transgender legislation to ever pass through the House of Representatives and a direct attack on the rights of parents to work with their children and their doctors to provide them with the medical care they need,” Takano said. “This bill is beyond cruel and its passage will forever be a stain on the institution of the United States Congress.”
The bill is unlikely to advance in the Senate, where it would need 60 votes to pass.
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