Trump hurls anti-trans slur at South Carolina Democrat Annie Andrews. The White House won’t explain why

President Donald Trump repeatedly used an anti-transgender slur on Monday to attack Dr. Annie Andrews, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in South Carolina.In a Truth Social post endorsing Republican Sen. Darline Graham, Trump used the slur three times, including as a mocking nickname for Andrews, who is not transgender. Hostility toward transgender people has become a persistent feature of his second presidency. The Advocate is not reproducing the slur.Trump accused Andrews, a pediatrician and mother of three, of supporting “Transgender for Everyone,” along with “Open Borders,” “Defunding the Police,” “High Taxes,” and a “Weak Military,” and claimed that she would seek to take away South Carolinians’ guns.Andrews did not directly address Trump’s language in her response.“As a mom and a pediatrician, I’m in this race to fight for my patients, my three kids, and South Carolina,” she said in a statement to NBC News, adding that she was focused on lowering costs and improving life for families.Related: Trump mocks cisgender women as weak in bizarre anti-trans sports rant to factory workersThe Advocate asked the White House whether Trump would use an anti-Black slur against a Black political opponent and, if not, why he considers an anti-transgender slur acceptable. The Advocate also asked why the president is using this kind of derogatory language about Americans.The White House did not respond.Trump’s choice of insult was not an isolated reference to transgender people. Since returning to the White House, the president has repeatedly invoked them in speeches, social media posts, policy announcements, and attacks on Democrats, even as transgender people make up a small fraction of the U.S. population.At times, Trump himself has remarked on their ubiquity in political conversation.“Everything is transgender. Everybody is transgender. That is all you hear about,” Trump said during an Oval Office appearance in March 2025.By then, hi