One of the most horrifying things about the fascist Trump regime that nonetheless remains slightly below the mainstream radar, is the objectively eugenicist undercurrent that runs through most of the government's public health and spending decisions. This ablest ideological plank built around the idea that Americans who can't work, are not valid members of our society, and active leeches on limited public resources, most recently burst into view during RFK Jr's dehumanizing rants about autism and autistic Americans, as well as ongoing GOP attempts to defend the homicidal class war budget reconciliation bill they're trying to ram through the Senate. These openly eugenicist declarations are always hidden behind a commitment to protect society's "most vulnerable people" but the proof is in the policy pudding, and everything about the Trumpenreich agenda seems to either ignore the existence of, or actively harm, anyone who cannot work even through no fault of their own - including aging and disabled Americans in the labor class.

Now, a recent report on the regime's proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year makes it clear that this targeted neglect and rampant ableism is woven directly into government policy. The Trumpenreich plans to defund "the Administration for Community Living (ACL) and related grant programs" in a heartless decision that seems likely to harm up to "one in five older Americans" and over 17 million disabled Americans who depend on ACL programs to lead fuller, happier, non-institutionalized lives.

https://truthout.org/articles/trumps-budget-would-limit-investigations-into-abuse-neglect-of-disabled-people/

Trump’s Budget Would Limit Investigations Into Abuse, Neglect of Disabled People

"If these programs are not funded, experts warn that an increasing number of disabled and aging Americans could be institutionalized with little oversight to ensure their rights are protected against abuse and neglect. The National Disability Rights Network (NDRN) called the plan to eliminate the programs “a direct and deliberate attack on people with disabilities, their families, and the systems that protect their rights, health, and independence.”

Alison Barkoff, who served as ACL’s acting administrator and assistant secretary for aging during the Biden administration, is now director of George Washington University’s health law and policy program. “The dismantling of ACL combined with the elimination of programs and these big Medicaid cuts are literally going to roll back decades of progress,” Barkoff told Truthout. “In terms of people with disabilities, the default [could become] people in institutions that are very unsafe with huge rights violations.”

There are two stories going on here simultaneously, and both of them are horrible fascist atrocities. In a pure material sense, the Trump regime plans to force your grandparents and millions of people with disabilities off of effective and vital assisted living programs that allow our loved ones to remain cherished parts of our communities, so they can give billionaire nazi broligarchs more cash to buy everything that isn't tied down in our society. The end result of these budget decisions will be more Americans who, and I cannot stress this enough, are capable of living happy, healthy, and cherished lives in our homes and communities, being warehoused in often abusive, dehumanizing institutional settings with little government oversight to prevent atrocities against our friends, families, and other loved ones. That isn't an ideological position, that's just the bottom line and it fits in perfectly with a larger pattern of disdain and neglect towards poor and marginalized people displayed by Trump, his administration, and the wealthy donors who own them; after all, rich ppl can afford the care necessary to keep their family members out of institutional settings, right?

As the article goes on to note however, this horrifying decision to purposely rewind time to a darker era of American disability rights and standards of care, isn't entirely financial in its motivations. Indeed, whatever savings the government is hoping to accomplish here are purely paper artifacts because public institutionalization of elderly and disabled Americans is going to cost the state a lot more money in the long run. No, the bald truth here is that this decision is rooted deeply in the Pork Reich's open disdain for the American people, and ideological belief that the labor class in this country is nothing more than a commodity; useful at times in terms of economic inputs, but an active blight on society to be eliminated once we can no longer serve our purpose of extracting wealth for the ruling classes. The billionaire nazis running this global far right political project are planning for a world with far less humans, and the puppets they own, including the Trump regime, are helping sort out who gets to survive to see the brave new world they envision.

Unfortunately, some recent interactions with well meaning cis-het people have lead me to believe that the reality of just how far mainstream, ostensibly anti-Trump figures in our media and political discourse are going to effectively aid the fascist anti-trans pogrom in progress today. I assume this is the result of a lack of knowledge, because the alternative is a lot more unflattering for all parties involved in these conversations. Okay, fair enough; obviously we have to spend more time talking about these egregious betrayals of human and civil rights by influential self-identified liberal institutions, when those targeted happen to be trans.

Let's start with the nationally-read "liberal" paper of distinction in the city that sits at the heart of the US federal government: the Washington Post. We've previously talked about HHS Secretary RFK Jr's sham review on trans care report that among many other horrors, embraced fascist pseudoscientific theories about trans people and promoted conversion therapy (also known as torturing the trans out of people) as a treatment for gender dysphoria; if you want to know more about why the entire report is anti-trans, eliminationist garbage you can find that post up in this thread. The short story here is that the HHS review is objectively an attack on trans existence in America, and is being widely rejected by pretty much every scientific or medical body that has cared to comment on it.

All of which apparently wasn't enough for the Washington Post to come out on the right side of this issue; in a May 11th, 2025 Op-Ed, the paper's editorial board fully embraced the report, and with it the harmful anti-trans propaganda and pseudoscience it was built on.

https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/washington-post-shamefully-endorses

Washington Post Shamefully Endorses RFK Jr's Pseudoscience Report On Trans People

"The Washington Post editorial board describes the HHS report—laden with disinformation and distortions about transgender care—as “careful” and “thorough.” While the op-ed concedes that the report was born out of executive orders that deny transgender people even exist, it fails to grapple with the obvious: the report was constructed to reach a predetermined conclusion. There is no world in which the study’s authors could have released any report affirming transgender healthcare’s importance, given the executive order that made it possible and those in charge of selecting the authors, whose names were kept anonymous. The editorial calls for “neutral, unbiased studies” on transgender health care, yet in the same breath treats a 400-page screed—designed explicitly to justify banning that care—as if it meets that standard. The contradiction is as glaring as it is dangerous.

Almost none of the content from the HHS report actually makes it into the Washington Post editorial. The piece largely ignores the avalanche of criticism from scientists, medical experts, and transgender people over the report’s glaring falsehoods. Nowhere in the editorial will readers learn that the report endorses thoroughly discredited theories like “rapid onset gender dysphoria” and “social contagion” to explain trans identity. It deadnames some of the earliest known transgender patients—seemingly out of spite—and classifies social transition, something as simple as a haircut and a new name, as a medical intervention requiring regulation. It leans heavily on fringe, debunked studies and repeatedly cites known anti-trans ideologues like Jesse Singal, Ray Blanchard, Paul Hruz, James Cantor, Michael Laidlaw, and Quinten Van Meter—figures courts and experts have ruled unqualified to speak on transgender health care. None of this, nor the hundreds of factual distortions and pseudoscientific claims littering the report, are addressed in the Post’s editorial."

I confess that I don't share Erin Reed's excellent journalism and analysis as often as I wish I could; the remarkable legwork she puts in to laying out and proving an argument is the same thing that often renders my additional commentary redundant. This article for example lays out an airtight case that for whatever reasons (latent transphobia, in my opinion) the WaPo editorial team has gone out of its way to embrace fascist pseudoscience that justifies harming trans Americans, in complete violation of their stated principles and how they've treated similar ideological junk science positions forwarded by RFK Jr, the HHS, and the Trump regime in general. I fully endorse every word of this piece and strongly encourage you to simply read all of it.

Finally I would like to remind all the well-meaning, trans-embracing liberals in my life and online, that I'm not saying you or even the vast majority of liberals in America hate trans people; it may rather be the opposite. But the traditional pillars of the liberal establishment *are* actively abandoning trans folks to our fate, in the face of a fascist GOP pogrom.