President Donald Trump recently announced National Child Abuse Prevention Month, attacking nontraditional families in the process.
In light of President Donald Trump’s recent statement on National Child Abuse Prevention Month, one thing remains clear: the Trump administration is directly targeting the LGBTQ+ community.
In a statement made on April 3, Trump claimed that “the most powerful safeguard against child abuse is a stable family…there is no substitute for a strong mother and father” and “one of the most prevalent forms of child abuse facing our country today is the sinister threat of gender ideology,” heavily implying that LGBTQ+ families, especially those not conforming to traditional gender roles, are inherently abusive to their children.
The statement was intended to proclaim April 2025 as National Child Abuse Prevention Month, which is dedicated to preventing and prosecuting child abuse.
However, upon a closer look, it is clear that Trump’s motives are not to promote awareness for abused and at-risk children: instead, he’s exploiting their stories to disguise his distaste for “nontraditional” families.
His statement focuses entirely on these “indoctrinating” families, barely touching on the actual children subjected to real abuse and neglect every day. Trump uses the words “devastating,” “sinister,” “evil” and “backwards” to describe the “lies” of the LGBTQ+ community, with over half of the written statement dedicated to berating queer parents and parents to transgender youth.
Instead of spreading awareness for the approximately 109,000 missing children being trafficked in America per year, Trump boasts about his part in Executive Order 14187 to defund institutions that offer puberty blockers, gender reassignment surgery and other methods of medical transitioning.
He also used religion as a basis for such anti-LGBTQ+ claims, with phrases like “the way God made you” and “God’s gift of life” to back up his argument against “gender ideology.” In a country that emphasizes Separation of Church and State and Freedom of Religion, this kind of behavior from the president should neither be accepted nor normalized.
Regardless of how conservative our president and Congress is, secularism is part of our constitution. By using religion to support such hateful ideas, Trump directly goes against American values in an effort to condemn those who don’t abide by his personal morals.
In the United States’ current political climate, it’s easy to miss notices like these that slip under the radar and are disguised as something as innocuous as National Child Abuse Prevention Month. However, it’s our duty as citizens to pay attention to and rebuke these attacks on American citizens, especially those in minority groups that are already subject to oppression.
Trump’s statement not only disrespects children subjected to neglect and abuse; it also blatantly threatens an entire group of Americans. With several states with heavy republican and religious influence already pushing to get Obergefell v. Hodges reexamined by the Supreme Court, it’s important now more than ever to call out anti-LGBTQ+ legislation.
