John,

To close out Pride month, I thought about telling a personal story about being a trans woman in the legislature during a time of historic hostility from Republican state legislators toward their trans constituents.

But then I remembered I literally wrote a book about it ("Burn the Page"), I've done countless interviews on that topic, and our 22-18 Democratic majority in the state Senate ensured none of the 12 anti-trans bills filed in Virginia would pass this year.

Simply put, I'm running for the state Senate to help keep it that way so we're focused on fixing roads and feeding kids instead of singling out and stigmatizing the very people we're elected to serve. That focus is why we've passed 41 of my bills into law during my three terms in the House of Delegates -- all with bipartisan support -- and it's the message I'm carrying door to door in this campaign.

Among the Republican state legislators who filed anti-trans bills this year, three lost their primaries last week, two are running in swing districts this fall, one is retiring, and three are in strong Republican districts. That means at least four of them aren’t coming back next year, so it turns out being the most virulent anti-trans candidate in their primary wasn't their ticket to success. Feel free to pop that balloon of anti-trans policies being even remotely good politics. Watch me fight against one of those bills below.

Watch Here

Here's the thing: if we have Democratic majorities in both chambers next year, then we don't even have to worry about these bills making it out of subcommittee, let alone becoming law. So please help me make that happen by donating $10, $25, $50, $100 or whatever you can do today to our campaign for the 30th District of the Virginia state Senate.

With a Democratic-led General Assembly, here's what I think will happen:

1) There will be fewer anti-trans bills introduced because the authors of them know those bills will be DOA and they don’t want to clog their legislative agenda with pure messaging bills guaranteed to fail. This played out during the 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 when we had a Democratic governor.

2) Members in strongly Republican districts trying to fend off primary challenges from their right will introduce anti-trans messaging bills without putting up much of a fight for them beyond getting their camera time in subcommittee and maybe a press conference or two because these bills are just for show to check a box.

3) You may have a true believer who channels my predecessor’s ideology while simultaneously channeling my predecessor’s propensity for getting his bills killed. To wit: all three of the Republicans who carried anti-trans bills this year who lost their primaries last week combined to pass zero of their 47 total bills this year. Meanwhile, the three Republicans who filed anti-trans bills this year and still won contested nomination contests actually did pass bills this year on other topics. This is not a coincidence.

The bottom line is at a time when Republican legislators have filed more than 500 anti-LGBTQ bills nationwide, Democrats need to show we're the party committed to taking care of our constituents' communities and quality of life while looking out for the most vulnerable people we represent. I'm running on a platform of constituent service, just like I've done each of my last three campaigns, and it's the message I know will prevail this Nov. 7.

So please pitch in with a donation before the end-of-quarter reporting deadline this Friday and let's go win this fall! Here is the link: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/danicaemails

Warmly,

Danica

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Manassas, VA 20113
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