Democratic presidential candidates have attacked President Donald Trump for his anti-LGBTQ policies.
Speaking to a crowd gathered in front of the Iowa State Capitol as part of the Des Moines gay pride festivities, the Democratic hopefuls said the Trump policies were harmful to LGBTQ Americans and promised if elected they would restore and expand the gay rights.
Seven candidates went after the president and offered their visions for how their administrations would handle gay rights differently. “We now have a president who is a racist, who is a sexist, who is a xenophobe, who is a religious bigot and who is a homophobe,” Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders said to cheers from the crowd.
Sanders promised to unify Americans behind a push to “end all forms of discrimination.”
Former Texas Representative Beto O’Rourke said Trump’s discriminatory actions and rhetoric “doesn’t just offend our sensibilities — it fundamentally changes who we are as a country.”
Former Maryland Rep John Delaney slammed Trump as a president “that is discriminatory in every sense of the word,” and New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand denounced the Trump administration’s rollback of protections for transgender students as “immoral.”
