CNN interviewed three transgender-identifying children and their moms on Wednesday as Tennessee defended its ban on irreversible transgender procedures on minors before the Supreme Court.
The panel, hosted by CNN’s Lucy Kafanov, featured the parents of the gender-confused children repeating transgender activist talking points and expressing fear about the incoming Trump administration. Kafanov prompted the panelists with questions about the $200 million Republicans spent on “anti-trans” ads during the last election, and asked them how they were “coping” with Trump’s election.
“I don’t know what kind of care my kids are going to need in the future, but I also believe in body autonomy and parental rights and so my kids deserve access to the same life-saving care that other cisgender kids are receiving without politicians interfering,” Hazel Heinzer claimed.
The claims about “live-saving” care were echoed by another mom who pointed to the “suicide rate of trans youth.”
Activists often tell parents that they can either have a living child with the procedures or a dead child without. But research actually shows that the procedures can actually increase the likelihood that minors will attempt suicide.
Paul Dupont, the communications director of the American Principles Project, told The Daily Wire that the entire segment was a dishonest push for transgender ideology.
“If there’s anyone still wondering why people are increasingly abandoning outlets like CNN, this segment should be Exhibit A,” he said. “It’s a perfect example of the blatant propaganda still being pushed by legacy news on an issue where public opinion has moved strongly against them.”
Michelle Callahan-Dumont, another one of the moms, said her child asked her three “frightening” questions after Trump won. She said that the child asked, “Are we going to have to move?”, “Are they going to take me away from you?” and “Am I not going to be able to get my medicine?”
Callahan-Dumont later told The Daily Signal that her child, a 10-year-old boy who identifies as a girl, “knew since birth” that he identified as transgender.
After yesterday’s SCOTUS hearing determining if states can ban trans procedures for kids, @DailySignal interviewed a family who claimed their son knew he was a trans girl since BIRTH🤱
Little did we know the family had already used their child for @CNN stardom. https://t.co/ytyWVk77Qn pic.twitter.com/ikwF8sme5l
— Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell (@TheElizMitchell) December 5, 2024
Callahan-Dumont’s child told CNN that he was scared of being shot in the street because of his identity. He said that he was afraid “that I’m going to be murdered, like one day I’m going be walking down the street and somebody’s going to come up and shoot me or something.”
The child said it made him “literally dead inside” when Republicans campaigned against performing transgender procedures on kids.
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Kafanov later asked the panel how it impacted their childhood by having “to fight for your right to exist.”
One of the kids responded, “my childhood is honestly kind of ruined” by having to deal with “so many like racist, anti-trans” people.
Lizette Trujillo said that her 17-year-old child has been lobbying since the age of 9, saying that she had spent the “majority” of her life “defending” her “existence.”
“I think that they would focus on real things, like climate change, instead of using our identities as a pawn just to get votes or just to stay in an office,” the child said about what she wished politicians would work on.
Dupont told The Daily Wire that Kafanov’s framing of the issue was a cynical effort to use distressed children.
“The saddest part about this segment is that it is ‘journalists’ like Kafanov who have been central in convincing transgender-identifying children like these that their lives are in danger,” he said.
“By framing conservative efforts to protect kids as threatening their ‘right to exist,’ Kafanov and her ilk have done more to terrorize these children than anyone else. And CNN’s decision to put these clearly distressed kids on national television only serves to validate concerns that they are being used to advance the cause of gender ideology with zero regard for their own well-being.”