Transgender Bathroom Bills Are Back. Does the Nation Care?

Matt Lavietes for NBC OUT contraststhe nationwide corporate and celebrity backlash to North Carolina’s 2016 transgender bathroom bill with the more “muted” response to last week’s passage of a similar bill in Utah. Recent efforts from the far-right to stoke outrage over LGBTQ issues, including the threats and boycotts aimed at both Budweiser and Target, could be a factor in the lack of uproar after the passage of Utah’s bathroom bill. PRRI data finds that while less than half of Americans (43%) say that “young people are being peer pressured into being transgender,” around three-quarters of Republicans (74%) agree with this statement.

Negotiators Release $118 Billion Border Bill As GOP Leaders Call It Dead in the House

NPR’s Deirdre Walsh and Claudia Grisales report that after months of negotiations, a trio of Senators have released an $118 billion bipartisan immigration agreement. The package includes funding for border provisions and new policies to address the border as well as national security funding for Ukraine and Israel and humanitarian assistance for conflict zones. The bill, however, faces resistance from some GOP leaders, with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) declaring it “dead on arrival.” PRRI findsAmericans are divided on policy when it comes to asylum seekers; about half (48%) oppose passing a law that would prevent asylum seekers from coming to the United States if they have not first sought protection in some other country, compared with 47% who favor such a law.

When QAnon Fundraises for Kari Lake

At POLITICO, Daniel Lippman reports that Arizona Republican Senate candidate Kari Lake was scheduled to headline a campaign fundraiser hosted by QAnon supporters on Friday. The fundraiser hosts, Caryn and Michael Borland, have endorsed QAnon, a conspiracy theory with beliefs that undermine election legitimacy, on their social media channels. Previously, the Borlands donated more than a million dollars to a Trump-RNC fundraising committee. According to PRRI’s 2023 American Values Survey, almost 3 in 10 Republicans (29%) are QAnon believers.

The White, Conservative Faith That Controls Christian Music

Allison McClain Merrill for Sojourners describes how a new book by PRRI Public Fellow Leah Payne, Ph.D., God Gave Rock and Roll to You,explores evolutions in Christian music, from targeting evangelical mothers eager to regulate their children’s media consumption in the 1990’s and 2000’s, to creating space for LGBTQ artists who are breaking genre traditions in the digital era. With its historical ties to conservative evangelical Christianity, Payne considers how changes in politics, society, and technology could redefine Christian music into the future. PRRI finds that 30% of Americans who switched from one religious tradition to another did so because of their former religion’s “negative teachings about or treatment of LGBTQ people.”