Attorney General Pam Bondi has directed the FBI to create a cash reward system for information leading to the arrest of leaders of so-called “domestic terrorist organizations,” a category the Justice Department now says includes people and groups associated with what it calls “radical gender ideology,” according to a December 4 memorandum. _****Keep up with the latest in****_ _****LGBTQ****_ _****+ news and politics.****__****Sign up for The Advocate's email newsletter.****_ The guidance operationalizes National Security Presidential Memorandum-7, issued by President Donald Trump in September, by ordering federal prosecutors and law enforcement agencies to prioritize investigations and prosecutions tied to an expansive definition of domestic terrorism. Independent journalist Ken Klippenstein first reported on the memo’s existence on Tuesday, after it was leaked. **Related:**Pam Bondi promises to 'respect the law' on marriage equality in Senate confirmation hearing Among the ideologies flagged are “adherence to radical gender ideology,” along with positions favoring mass migration, anti-capitalism, anti-Christianity, and hostility toward “traditional views on family, religion, and morality,” the memo states. While the directive does not explicitly name transgender people, advocates say the language effectively targets trans communities and those who support them, given the administration’s repeated use of “gender ideology” as a catchall for transgender identity, health care, education, and civil rights advocacy. “For some culpable actors, such as certain Antifa-aligned extremists, their animating principle is adherence to the types of extreme viewpoints on immigration, radical gender ideology, and anti-American sentiment listed below, with a willingness to use violence against law-abiding citizenry to serve those beliefs,” the memo states. The memo instructs prosecutors to consider a broad range of criminal statutes, including obstruction during civil disorders, conspiracy against rights, and providing material support for terrorism, when pursuing cases connected to protests or advocacy linked to the newly defined threats. **Related:**Trump AG Pam Bondi falsely compares gender-affirming care for minors as the same as female genital mutilation Bondi’s guidance also orders federal agencies to comb their files for intelligence related to Antifa and “Antifa-aligned” groups and deliver that information to the FBI within two weeks. Within 30 days, the FBI is directed to compile a list of organizations whose actions “may constitute domestic terrorism,” issue intelligence bulletins on those groups’ structures and funding, and more prominently publicize its domestic-terrorism tip line. Most controversially, the memo directs the FBI to establish a cash reward system — a bounty — for tips that lead to the identification and arrest of leaders of targeted organizations. Paired with the memo’s ideological framing, the policy risks encouraging informants to report on peaceful activists, LGBTQ+ organizations, or health care providers based on politics rather than evidence of violence. “The FBI shall establish a cash reward system for information that leads to the successful identification and arrest of individuals in the leadership of domestic terrorist organizations that conspire with others to commit violations of the provisions of law listed in section 2 of this guidance or other offenses against the United States,” Bondi wrote. **Related:**Who is Pam Bondi? Trump's attorney general pick has a mixed history on LGBTQ+ issues Notably absent from the memo is any acknowledgment of the overwhelming body of research showing that the majority of domestic terrorist violence in the United States is linked to right-wing extremism. In October, weeks before Bondi’s memo surfaced, Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, warned _The Advocate_ that LGBTQ+ organizations were already bracing for government investigations, and that such threats should be taken literally. “Yes. Oh my goodness. If you’re awake, you should be concerned,” Robinson said when asked about the administration’s signaling that it could investigate organizations on the left. “Because what we’re seeing is not only threats, but we’re seeing them taking action.” Robinson pointed to Project 2025 as evidence that stated intentions often become policy. “Anytime you hear their intentions out loud, we have to take that seriously,” she said. “We don’t need to wait until it all comes to hit us and then try to catch up on the backend.” As a result, Robinson said, advocacy organizations were already planning for an environment resembling authoritarian regimes abroad. “A lot of organizations are thinking about physical and cybersecurity and safety for staff and volunteers,” she said. “We’re doing a lot of work around organizational resilience and learning from colleagues abroad about what it means to adapt in authoritarian environments.” The administration increasingly frames transgender rights as a national security issue. Earlier this year, federal agencies were weighing whether to fold trans-related activism into emerging violent extremism categories, heightening fears of a modern-day “Lavender Scare” repackaged for the surveillance age.

As the last vote of the day on Wednesday evening, the U.S. House passed a bill that would make doctors and parents criminals for providing gender-affirming medical care to transgender minors, marking the first time Congress has approved a national ban on such treatment and escalating a years-long Republican campaign to regulate transgender lives through federal law. It now goes to the Senate, where it is unlikely to pass. **_Keep up with the latest in_** _**_LGBTQ_**_** _+ news and politics._**_**_Sign up for The Advocate's email newsletter._**_ The legislation, introduced by Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and titled the Protect Children’s Innocence Act, would impose felony penalties of up to 10 years in prison on physicians who provide puberty blockers, hormone therapy, or surgical care to patients under 18. The bill would also expose parents and others who consent to or help minors access that care to criminal liability. The bill passed with 216 members voting for it and 211 against it. Three Democrats, Texas Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, and North Carolina Rep. Don Davis joined all but four Republicans in supporting the bill’s passage. President Donald Trump recently pardoned Cuellar after the congressman was indicted on a dozen charges of bribery, money laundering, and conspiracy. Democrats Reps. Eric Swalwell of California, Lucy McBath of Georgia, and Joe Courtney of Connecticut did not vote. Swalwell is running for governor of California. Republican Reps. Gabe Evans of Colorado, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Mike Kennedy of Utah, and Mike Lawler of New York voted against the measure. **Related:**House GOP advances Marjorie Taylor Greene’s transphobic bill banning gender-affirming care for trans youth Every major medical association in the U.S., including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, supports providing this evidence-based and safe care to young people when supervised by a qualified health care provider. The vote represents a watershed moment in the national fight over transgender rights, transforming what has largely been a state-level effort to ban gender-affirming care for minors into a federal mandate with sweeping implications for medical practice, family autonomy, and constitutional law. Democrats in the Senate are expected to reject the measure and attempt to block or delay its passage. Before the House voted on the bill, Vermont U.S. Rep. Becca Balint, a Democrat, offered the motion to recommit — the minority party’s final opportunity to amend or send the bill back to committee before a vote on final passage. The motion failed, allowing the House to proceed to final passage of the legislation. After the bill passed, out California U.S. Rep. Mark Takano, chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, criticized the result in a statement. “This bill is the most extreme anti-transgender legislation to ever pass through the House of Representatives and a direct attack on the rights of parents to work with their children and their doctors to provide them with the medical care they need. If this bill becomes law, doctors, pharmacists, and — in some circumstances — the parents of young trans people, would face time in prison for choosing to prioritize their child’s health," Takano said. "This bill is beyond cruel and its passage will forever be a stain on the institution of the United States Congress." Ahead of the vote, Greene publicly clashed with fellow Republicans over proposed changes to her bill, accusing House leadership and Rep. Chip Roy of Texas of weakening its scope. In a series of posts on X, Greene wrote that her original proposal relied on Congress’s authority under the Commerce Clause to criminalize all pediatric gender-affirming care nationwide, while Roy’s amendment would instead limit federal funding to facilities that provide such care. “My bill fully criminalizes it if passed as a stand-alone bill,” Greene wrote, adding that allowing Roy’s amendment to advance would leave what she called “California trans child sanctuary state policies and laws” untouched. She warned that if the amendment passed, “Republicans will be fully responsible for NOT stopping the evil trans agenda on kids.” **Related:**Behind Marjorie Taylor Greene's latest push to criminalize gender-affirming care > — (@) Greene pushed the bill as a fulfillment of what she described as a promise by Trump and congressional Republicans to “protect kids from the trans agenda.” The House’s approval came during Greene’s final weeks in Congress. She announced last month that she will resign in early January, following escalating clashes with House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana and growing distance from Trump and his allies. **Related:**Citing Skrmetti, appeals court rejects challenge to Oklahoma ban on gender-affirming care for youth Democrats and LGBTQ+ advocates warned that the legislation would have immediate and far-reaching consequences, regardless of whether it ultimately becomes law. Those concerns were echoed during a press call Tuesday organized by the Human Rights Campaign ahead of the vote. Kelley Robinson, the organization’s president, pointed out the bill would criminalize care widely accepted within the medical community. “They want to put pediatricians and parents into a jail cell for caring for their kids,” Robinson said. “I have to ask again, what are we doing here?” Robinson argued that the legislation reflected misplaced priorities as Congress approaches major health care deadlines. “There are plenty of things that the American people are begging for them to work on,” she said, warning that millions could lose insurance coverage without Republican action to extend tax subsidies. Instead, she said, lawmakers were ending the year “spending their time and energy voting on proposals that target a tiny vulnerable group of people in this country, transgender kids.” Medical experts warned that the bill’s passage could chill care nationwide. Dr. Kenneth Haller, an emeritus professor of pediatrics at Saint Louis University School of Medicine, said similar state restrictions had already driven families out of Missouri. “Until recently, I have never had to tell parents that despite safe, effective, thoroughly researched treatments for a condition that is causing their child to suffer, the state has made these treatments illegal,” he said. “It is not science. It is just blind ideology.” **Related:**Supreme Court rules states can ban gender-affirming care for youth in U.S. v. Skrmetti Advocates for transgender youth emphasized that the harm is already being felt. Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, a senior vice president at the Trevor Project, said the organization’s crisis counselors regularly hear from young people distressed by political attacks on their health care. “This care has quite literally been lifesaving for so many young people,” he said, adding that the group’s most recent national survey found that 90 percent of LGBTQ+ youth said recent politics had negatively affected their mental health. Parents described the legislation as life-altering. Rachel Gonzalez, a Texas parent of a transgender teenager, said her family relocated out of state after losing access to care. “No politician should be in any doctor’s office or living room making private health care decisions,” she said. “No trans youth should ever be used as a political pawn.” Takano added, "At a time where the federal government is already so hostile towards the transgender community, it is imperative that Senate Democrats hold the line to prevent this dangerous bill from reaching President Trump’s desk in order to protect the rights and safety of young trans people and their families.” _Editor's note: This story has been updated to include the names of the Democratic members of Congress who voted for the bill._

Donald Trump addressed the nation in prime time Wednesday night, and his speech, mercifully brief, was full of the usual lies and distortions, plus his typical unwarranted attack on transgender people. Here are five key takeaways. ## "Transgender for everybody” — bingo! If you had “men in women’s sports” and “transgender for everybody” on your bingo card, you win! Trump used both phrases in the first minutes of his speech, saying that before he took office, “We had men in women’s sports, transgender for everybody.” For the record, trans women are not men, and no one has proposed that everyone should transition their gender, but Trump has a beyond-odd obsession with that concept. **Related:** 11 times Donald Trump has randomly brought up his ‘transgender for everybody’ obsession **Related:** Donald Trump’s government declares that transgender and nonbinary people don’t exist ## Everything bad is the fault of Joe Biden and the Democrats. Except it’s not. “Eleven months ago, I inherited a mess and I’m fixing it,” Trump said. He claimed inflation was at a record high under Biden; it was not. It was about 9.1 percent in June 2022, but inflation was higher than that at several points in the country’s history. He touted job growth, but unemployment in November was 4.6 percent, the highest in four years. His claim that 100 percent of jobs created under his administration were in the private sector is likewise false. Citing prices of consumer goods under the Biden administration, Trump said he is “bringing those high prices down and bringing them down very fast.” However, prices remain high, and Trump gave false information about the price of gas being $1.99 in some places, which is not true, and said the price of a Thanksgiving turkey was down 33 percent from last year, also false. Trump further alleged that crime was at a record high during the Biden administration, but the U.S. Department of Justice has reported that while there was an increase in violent crime in 2021, toward the end of the COVID-19 pandemic, it declined significantly later in Biden’s tenure. ## Trump continues to demonize immigrants. Trump claimed that Biden had an “open borders” policy that led to an invasion of criminal immigrants, including drug dealers and murderers. But “immigrants — including undocumented immigrants — are less likely to commit crimes than the U.S.-born,” according to a 2024 report by the American Immigration Council. “This is true at the national, state, county, and neighborhood levels, and for both violent and non-violent crime.” He also claimed that Somali immigrants have taken over Minnesota and trashed the state. While Minnesota has the largest concentration of people of Somali descent of any state, they make up only 2 percent of the population. Most are citizens, either by birth or naturalization, and most are doing no harm to the state. ## Tariffs haven’t led to factory construction. Because of his tariffs, companies are “building factories and plants at levels we haven’t seen,” Trump said. But spending on factory construction, which rose during the Biden administration, has declined this year, according to the Federal Reserve. ## He uses mathematically challenged figures. Trump claimed his negotiations with drug companies would reduce prescription prices by “400, 500, even 600 percent.” But if prices decreased by 100 percent, the drugs would cost nothing. ## One good thing about the speech: It was short. Trump spoke at a rapid pace, and the address lasted only 18 minutes. But it “will keep fact checkers busy for hours,” _New York Times _White House reporter Katie Rogers wrote. Well, probably longer.

Edward Kelley faced a separate prosecution for targeting federal agents while he was being investigated for his role in the Capitol attack.