For one Alabama family, Trump’s anti-trans rhetoric nearly cost them their son’s life

Once news outlets called the election for Trump in the early hours of November 6, panic ripped through the LGBTQIA+ community and hotlines saw a dramatic surge in calls. Michelle Del Rey reports

Carolyn Fisher will never forget the moment her son told her he wanted to die.

It was November 3, two days before the presidential election. Fisher’s 16-year-old non-binary son, who uses he/they pronouns, was part of an online suicide pact with three other transgender and non-binary teens in Florida, Alabama and Tennessee. The friends who’d met on Discord had agreed to die by suicide if former president Donald Trump won the 2024 election.

The plan had been set since September. The teens hoped their deaths would send a message to conservative lawmakers and stop them from enacting restrictive policies targeting trans youth.

But as the election approached, her son called a crisis hotline for help. He told the case manager on the other line about the plan, and the case manager helped them tell his parents.

Gathered around their kitchen table, Fisher asked her child what was going on.

“He started crying, and he said, ‘Mama, I want to die,’” Fisher told The Independent. Her son pulled out a notebook and listed all of the reasons he had jotted down explaining why his life would be miserable under a second Trump presidency.

“I lost it,” said Fisher. “I could not believe my child had been online planning to take his life with other kids.”

Fisher and her husband did not realize how Trump’s win could greatly impact their child’s life.

The couple were ardent Trump supporters. They had a Trump/Vance sign on their front lawn, a Trump bumper sticker on their car and attended most of the GOP meetings in Hoover, Alabama, where they live. They’d tried to take their son with them but they wouldn’t go.

As Trump shuffled from campaign rally to campaign rally, he painted trans Americans as a threat. Trump vowed to prohibit trans minors from accessing gender-affirming care and ban them from playing on sports teams corresponding with their gender. Republican groups had spent millions on anti-trans TV ads during the election cycle.

Protesters cheer on speakers during a Kentucky rally in opposition to the Transgender Health Bill in March 2023 (Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

The rhetoric became too much for their child, who came out to his parents less than two years ago.

Once news outlets called the election for Trump in the early hours of November 6, panic ripped through the LGBTQIA+ community. The Trevor Project saw an overall 700 percent increase in crisis calls, chats and texts compared to prior weeks. The Rainbow Youth Project, the hotline Carolyn’s son dialed, fielded 5,462 calls during the first 11 days of November. Their monthly average is usually around 3,700.

Advocates began encouraging trans people to get passports, update state IDs, have supplies of medication on hand, and, if they’re able, prepare to move.

In hindsight, Fisher could see her child was unhappy. When her son started to socially transition, kids at his school bullied him. One peer told him: “You want to be a boy? Fight like a boy,” Fisher said. The school system itself wasn’t affirming either.

Her child’s public high school has a policy prohibiting trans teens from using bathrooms corresponding with their gender. The school made accommodations, but Carolyn’s son said using a staff bathroom only brought them more attention. Instead, he’d monitor his water intake and hold it in, causing him to develop kidney problems, his mother said.

Shortly after the school year began, he stopped participating in school activities like theater, weightlifting and track. They told their parents they felt uncomfortable going because of the conservative area they live in.

“Everything here is Trump,” noted Fisher.

About a month and a half ago, her son asked his parents if he had a life insurance policy. Fisher didn’t think much of it at the time.

When she and her husband found out about the pact, they immediately helped contact the other parents involved, removed all the firearms from their house, pulled their son out of his school and enrolled him in online classes. Fisher started going into her son’s room every 30 to 45 minutes to make sure he was still breathing.

She and her husband ultimately voted for Vice President Kamala Harris in solidarity with their son.

“My son said, ‘You can’t tell me you love me and support somebody who’s going to hurt me,’” Fisher recalled.

Upon learning that Trump had been re-elected, her son told her: “The majority of this country just agreed with him that I should not exist.”

In Tucson, Arizona, about 1,500 miles away from Alabama, Daniel Trujillo, 17, was grappling with his own feelings about the presidential election. He was nine when Trump won his first term and had come out as a trans boy to his parents a year before.

This election, the stakes felt higher for him and his family because of the “heightened” and “dangerous” rhetoric, Daniel and his mother, Lizette, told The Independent.

After Trump won, Daniel and his friends became fearful about what their futures would look like. Daniel, too, had been bullied in school. Earlier in his life, his mom had him transferred to a different school district 45 minutes away with a gender-affirming policy. Even under Trump’s first term, he was able to use a bathroom corresponding with his gender identity.

But, since the election, Daniel has seen an uptick in kids being transphobic, homophobic and racist.

“Now people are just being a lot louder about their hate,” he said.

For years, he and his mom organized against an onslaught of anti-trans legislation at the Arizona Capitol. Since 2019, 1,730 anti-trans bills have been introduced across the country, according to Trans Legislation Tracker. During that time, Lizette kept getting flyers with misinformation about gender-affirming care.

“This has been an active multi-year effort to attack trans people and I wish more people understood that,” she said. “As a mother, I feel outnumbered.”

Daniel Trujillo, 17, and his mother, Lizette, fear what’s next for trans children in a second Trump presidency (Courtesy of Daniel and Lizette Trujillo)

“It’s so crazy,” added Daniel. “There are things that are affecting communities and actively hurting people... trans people are not one of those things.”

Daniel has about two years of high school left. He dreams of attending Berklee College of Music to study guitar. He and his mom have discussed moving out of state should Arizona install regressive policies before he graduates. But Lizette takes issue with the idea that her family should have to move because she has a transgender child.

“The idea that we have to migrate out of our states to live in other places is disgusting and it should make everyone question what our country stands for and whether this is truly a democracy,” she said. “Having a transgender son shouldn’t allow for this country to discriminate against us and force us out of the place that we call home.”

Moving isn’t off the table for Carolyn and her family in Alabama, but she isn’t sure where would be safest. In October, a 16-year-old trans boy in Washington state was beaten by three other teenagers in an attack that was caught on camera. The child was left with a concussion and a possible traumatic brain injury, his mother told KING-TV, an NBC affiliate.

Carolyn’s child wants to move out of Alabama when they graduate high school and work with animals. In the meantime, Carolyn and her family are working to process what almost happened. Her child wants to attend a nearby charter school with an LGBTQIA+-affirming learning environment. His parents are learning how to best support their son.

A few weeks ago, Carolyn’s husband purchased a trans flag and put it on their family’s front porch.

She said she is surprised no one has ripped it down yet.

If you are based in the USA, and you or someone you know needs mental health assistance right now, call the National Suicide Prevention Helpline on 1-800-273-TALK (8255). This is a free, confidential crisis hotline that is available to everyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The Rainbow Youth Project’s crisis hotline can be reached at (317) 643-4888. The Trevor Project’s hotline is at (866) 488-7386.

If you are experiencing feelings of distress, or are struggling to cope, you can speak to the Samaritans, in confidence, on 116 123 (UK and ROI), email jo@samaritans.org, or visit the Samaritans website to find details of your nearest branch.

If you are in another country, you can go to www.befrienders.org to find a helpline near you.