Transgender orthodoxy is in retreat in medicine, the courts, and even business—as the LGBTQ mafia bleeds allies in corporate America. The Human Rights Campaign has long employed mafia-like tactics to pressure companies to toe the line on gender ideology, but a growing chorus of critics, assisted by President Donald Trump’s second administration, has led companies to reconsider their alliances with the organization. About three-quarters of all Fortune 500 companies (377) disclosed their business practices to HRC in 2025, so the LGBTQ activist group could rate them on its Corporate Equality Index. This year, however, only 131 companies are working with HRC—a 65% drop. This represents a massive hit to the transgender industrial complex, but conservatives shouldn’t rest on their laurels. In the very press release where HRC admits its massive losses, it touts its abiding impact: the companies still working with HRC employ over 22 million Americans. HRC’s Social Credit Score The Human Rights Campaign bills itself as “the nation’s largest LGBTQ+ civil rights organization,” and it takes credit for “transforming the institutions and systems that shape our everyday lives by advancing LGBTQ+ inclusive policies and practices in schools, workplaces, hospitals, communities and beyond.” That sounds noble. Americans support being “inclusive,” right? Yet many Americans vehemently disagree with HRC’s interpretation of this purported “inclusion.” When it comes to transgender orthodoxy, “inclusion” means allowing men into women’s intimate spaces. In the corporate setting, it means forcing employees to endorse the lie that a man can become a woman and vice versa. It means celebrating as “joyful” behaviors that many Americans of good conscience consider sinful or depraved. The “inclusion” travels only in one direction. How does HRC “transform” institutions? Its Corporate Equality Index gives every major company a rating to show just how pro-“equality” the company is. Investors in the environmental, social, and governance movement used the index to determine where their money goes, and this made the index extremely powerful. Like the mafia or Al Capone, the Human Rights Campaign promises these brands protection from the Left’s activist investors and protester shock troops in exchange for a generous cut. In order to demonstrate their “inclusion,” companies make contributions to LGBTQ groups, partner with transgender influencers like Dylan Mulvaney, and promote rainbow products. When Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election, HRC released a list of policy preferences, and Biden’s administration met at least 75% of them. Examples include massive policies—like reinterpreting civil rights law to allow men to invade women’s spaces—and mundane policies—like directing Border Patrol to use the preferred pronouns of illegal aliens. ??THE TRANSGENDER ADMINISTRATIVE STATEThe Human Rights Campaign rates companies based on how pro-LGBTQ they are. The "Corporate Equality Index" is arguably behind both Bud Light and Target going overboard on transgender messaging and losing customers in 2023.HRC also had what… pic.twitter.com/pbPznX43Z7— Tyler O'Neil (@Tyler2ONeil) January 21, 2025 Why Is HRC in Retreat? Companies began to desert HRC even before President Trump won reelection in 2024. In 2023, transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney partnered with Bud Light, and the beer lost its top spot in sales rankings. Similarly, Target sales slumped when the company launched a new line of transgender products, including “tuck” swimsuits designed to make men appear female. Conservatives launched pressure campaigns of their own. Alliance Defending Freedom launched a “Viewpoint Diversity Score” to counter HRC’s version, rating companies on whether they respect customers’ religious freedom, whether they harbor religious and ideological diversity, and whether they respect various views in charity and society. 1792 Exchange launched a “Back to Business Tracker” to encourage businesses to withdraw from HRC’s index, to dissolve “diversity, equity, and inclusion” policies, and to refrain from taking divisive positions on political or cultural issues. The Heritage Foundation, Bowyer Research, Inspire Investing, and the National Center for Public Policy Research have engaged in shareholder activism, purchasing shares in major companies and filing resolutions to push companies away from leftist causes and back toward neutrality. This activism has led companies to distance themselves from the Southern Poverty Law Center, which enforces the transgender agenda by demonizing its conservative critics. Conservative activists like Robby Starbuck have taken a page out of the Left’s playbook and started calling companies, urging them to stop allying with HRC. This conservative engagement led companies whose customer bases aren’t a good fit for HRC—firms like Molson Coors, Ford, Harley-Davidson, Jack Daniels, and Lowe’s—to leave HRC in 2024. Backlash to Transgenderism Under Trump’s second term, the trend has only accelerated. Not only has the federal government rejected transgender orthodoxy and DEI, but the medical industry is also starting to wake up to just how destructive transgender orthodoxy can be. A jury recently ordered doctors to pay $2 million to a detransitioner who regretted having her breasts removed. Last week, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons recommended against transgender surgeries for minors, and even said the data doesn’t support hormones for minors. These positive signs should not give gender critics a false sense of security, however. Even while acknowledging its losses, the Human Rights Campaign celebrated that companies opting into its Corporate Equality Index employ over 22 million U.S. employees. A whopping 534 companies earned the top score of 100, and these companies represent nearly 6 million employees. Sanity is winning, but the LGBTQ mafia isn’t going to go away. ADF, 1792 Exchange, Heritage, Starbuck, and others should be encouraged, but also cannot afford to let up the pressure. Here’s hoping HRC loses even more Fortune 500 allies next year. The post IN RETREAT: LGBTQ Mafia Loses More Than Half Its Fortune 500 Partners appeared first on The Daily Signal.

A new Trump-aligned nonprofit is launching to fill a gap in enforcement of the president’s election integrity executive order. Nicole Kelly, senior counsel at Lex Politica, the law firm that represents Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, and other Republicans, is the president of a new 501(c)4 called Save Election Day to lead the fight in battleground states to implement the initiatives identified by President Donald Trump’s executive order last March. “President Trump’s executive order that came out last March that really sparked the initial idea here because this organization was founded for one single purpose,” Kelly told The Daily Signal, “which we believe is existential to the future of the United States democracy, which is to lead the fight in the states to implement the key initiatives that were identified and outlined by President Trump.” Save Election Day is particularly aimed at implementing several policies nationwide: one single Election Day; requirements of photo ID to vote; elimination or reduction of mail-in balloting and early voting periods; elimination of post-Election Day ballot receipt periods; and bans on noncitizen voting. “This organization is specifically designed for state law and to lead the fight specifically in the states to implement the executive order,” Kelly said. While other conservative groups have fought bad election laws with litigation, Kelly said Save Election Day will work to actually change those laws. “This organization is actually going to be focused on changing the laws that are on the books through legislation, through ballot initiatives, through administrative actions, constitutional amendments,” Kelly said. “It will, in some cases, necessarily involve litigation, just because, of course, Democrats are going to sue over some of the changes that they don’t want made in elections to clean them up,” she said, “but the focus here will be changing the law that’s on the books, so that when it comes to election integrity operations, whatever is being enforced is actually good law, not just trying to be defensive.” While Kelly says conservative legal organizations have done great work in elections, the needle hasn’t moved enough. “The president has a lot of passion and fervor, and we wanted that same energy for this type of organization to be very action oriented, to make sure that these very important election reforms are made,” she said. While many states have already passed election reform, a lot of work remains, Kelly says. Fourteen states currently do not require any ID to vote, and 11 states currently have ID requirements considered “weak,” allowing voters to sign an affidavit or vouch for identity without presenting photo ID or undergoing a signature comparison. Furthermore, 14 states currently allow mail ballots to be received after Election Day, and 32 states lack any explicit noncitizen voting ban in their state constitutions. “Our priorities are going to be battleground states that have significant impact for Republicans in 2026 and 2028,” Kelly said, “but again, and we’re not going to stop this mission until 50 out of 50 states have all of these tenants of the executive order implemented.” The post Nonprofit Launches to Implement Trump’s Election Integrity Executive Order appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Valentine’s Day has become a large national celebration. It’s an excuse for couples to rekindle their love through date nights and a chance for kids to give candy and cards to their classmates. Many houses in my neighborhood place red lights on their homes as a way to prepare for the holiday. These gestures are nice. Some of them are more intentional and meaningful than others. However, the true foundation of this day is built on the firm ground of sacrifice. St. Valentine was a bishop who lived in the third century. Emperor Claudius II was in power during Valentine’s life, and he decided to outlaw marriage because he believed that this would help him gain more soldiers in his army. Despite this law, Valentine decided to support those who desired to live out their vocation. He began marrying couples in secret despite the new law. He knew that love was more powerful and important than anything else in this world. He knew that the number one priority of our lives is to love and give ourselves away in sacrifice. When word spread about Valentine’s actions, he was imprisoned. His decision to marry couples cost him his freedom and, ultimately, his life. While in jail, he became friendly with the jailor. They would have conversations and became close. Valentine was even credited for healing the jailer’s blind daughter. Valentine and the daughter became close and he would frequently sign his letters to her “your Valentine.” Valentine’s Day is therefore concerned with romantic love. That is accurate and historical, based on this bishop’s desire to marry couples against the law of the emperor. There is something about the love of a husband and wife that is meant to be all-encompassing. Marriage is a perpetual and unbreakable bond, which promises the future of self to the other, no matter what the circumstances of that future might look like. In this way, we see that love is built on a choice, not a feeling. Too many people in today’s culture, unfortunately, claim that love is about a feeling. Once we fall out of love, we no longer need to remain together, even if we have committed our lives to each other. The witness of St. Valentine, rooted in the cross of Christ and the logic of love, states that true love is personified by acting for someone’s good when we don’t feel like it. This truth is encapsulated in the life of Mother Teresa, perhaps the most impactful modern saint, who would often say: “Love to be real, it must cost—it must hurt—it must empty us of self.” On Valentine’s Day this year, this is the most appropriate question: Do my most important relationships (spouse, child, parent, sibling, best friend) cost me anything? What am I willing to do to ensure that my love for these people is sacrificial and not selfish? Ultimately, this depends on our circumstances, but there are some sacrificial characteristics that we can learn from St. Valentine and apply them to our own lives. First, sacrifice takes intentionality. The man or woman of great sacrificial love deeply reflects on and considers how they can act for the one they love in a way that reveals their heart for them. Second, it takes vulnerability. The word “vulnerable” literally means capable of being wounded. Valentine was willing to risk his life so that couples could enter the unbeatable bond of marriage. All love requires that we make ourselves vulnerable in a radical way for the other. We do this by placing all that we are before them to ensure they know we will do anything for their good. Finally, Valentine teaches us that true love means going above and beyond. It was not good enough for Valentine to simply supper these couples or tell them the emperor was wrong. He married them and cared for them. Even when he was imprisoned for doing so, Valentine continued to love those around him like the jailor’s daughter—because true love knows no end. So, on this Valentine’s Day, how can your love be grounded in sacrifice? For that is the entire reason for the day. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.  The post Love as Sacrifice: A Valentine’s Lesson appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Trump administration has created an incentive for Americans to have more children within the next three years. Any baby born between Jan. 1, 2025, and Dec. 31, 2028, is eligible for $1,000 of seed money in a tax-advantaged investment account known as a “Trump Account,” though any parent with a child under 18 can open an account for their son or daughter. The account operates similarly to an IRA, and parents, relatives, and friends can contribute up to $5,000 annually, though they do not have to make regular contributions. “Your child’s funds will automatically be invested in American companies,” according to the Trump Accounts website. When the child turns 18, they can either allow the account to continue to grow, or they can withdraw the funds for education costs or to purchase a home. If the maximum amount is contributed to the account annually from the time the child is born, the account will have grown to over $270,000 by the child’s 18th birthday. Between the rapid increase in the cost of living over the past 20 years and many young people in debt with student loans, true financial freedom is a distant dream for many in their 20s and 30s, but Trump Accounts could change that for the next generation. If Americans take advantage of the program to its full extent, Generation Alpha, born between 2010 and 2024, and Beta, born between 2025 and 2039, can hope to avoid the financial situation many Millennials and members of Gen Z find themselves in today. On this week’s edition of “Problematic Women,” we discuss the potential financial and political implications of Trump Accounts. Plus, we celebrate the day of love and romance with our favorite hot takes on Valentine’s Day. Enjoy the show! The post OH BABY! Couples Could Make Big Money on Trump Accounts appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos. Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson. There’s about nine months left into the midterm elections in November. And how should we envision this with the current administration, its chances of retaining control of the House or Senate? Well, I think the best simile is that there’s a pathway over the mountains, like a pass, but on one side there’s a shear drop, and the other, there’s, on the right side, there is ample room, if you travel close to the mountains and not get near the precipice. Now, what is the precipice? There is a pathway to save the Republican Congress and thereby to save the Trump counterrevolution. We saw what the alternative was under Joe Biden, but it’ll be much worse in 2028 if a Kamala Harris wins and has a Democratic Congress waiting for her, which she could have, at least at the beginning of it in November. So, what do we have to look at? What are the perils that you’ll fall over the cliff as you go on the pass to the midterm? The first is these unforced errors. I don’t want to get into who did it or whose fault it is. I’m just suggesting that when you say Rob Reiner after his death, you say something untoward, I’m talking in a strict political sense now, it’s not good. Why? Because to repeat the Trump success in 2024, you must do three things. You must win black males at 26%. You must win Hispanic males about 55% and get them out to vote. And you must win or come break even with independents. That’s in addition to getting your base out. But if you make fun of Rob Reiner after he’s dead and not say, you know, not honor the old Latin warning [de mortuis nil nisi bonum], don’t say anything bad, don’t say anything unless it’s good about the dead, then you’re going to offend whom? The independents. And so, this week we had this strange little meme or video that President Donald Trump was sort of the Lion King, and all of his enemies were various animals that inhabit the jungle. And I think Joe Biden was an ape and all that. But there was the Obamas portrayed as primates. Now, you could argue two things. Well, Joe Biden was too, so it wasn’t racial or he didn’t care what you thought of it. He didn’t think it was racial. And the Obamas, remember, Barack Obama engineered, tried to engineer his destruction in August, September, October of 2015, before the election, when they called in John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey, and said, ignore the intelligence, go after Trump. But that doesn’t matter. The matter is there’s a whole history of the United States of racism that equates people who are black with primates. So, whoever did it in the White House, or whether it was an ad for an upcoming TikTok video, it doesn’t matter, people don’t matter, the independents don’t like that. And you will either lose independent votes or you will lose a week of precious time trying to explain what I just did. And then finally, as you’re going toward the midterms, there’s a sheer drop, another sheer drop, and that’s called history. Only three times in the last hundred years has an incumbent president in his midterm, first or second—this is Trump’s second midterm—picked up seats. They usually lose seats. The problem is, in the House, he can’t afford more than four or five seats, depending on these special elections. He could even lose the Senate. I don’t think that’s possible, but it could happen. We saw what happened in 2020 in Georgia when he lost two conservative seats in one of the most conservative states, Georgia, to, not Democrats, but hard leftists. It’s possible. So, you have to break history’s pattern. George W. Bush did it. He picked up seats. And you can do it. FDR did in his first, I think, 1934 election. You can do it, but you have to do everything right, keep away from the precipice. So, what’s in his favor? In his favor is he has already enacted the architecture of a radical economic revolution that’s going to pay dividends in March, April, May, and just get better. And that’s based on, not speculation on my part, but fact. The biggest deregulation movement since the Reagan revolution. Tax cuts, and not just tax cuts for affluent people, for waitresses, for people on Social Security, etc. And then there’s energy development. We’re gonna get up to 14 million, 15 million barrels of oil. So, whatever’s gonna happen in the Middle East, we have a buffer that we’ve never enjoyed before. And then in addition to that, there’s, Trump says, $18 trillion in foreign investment. Just cut it in half and say $9 trillion. That’s nine times larger than Joe Biden’s trillion dollars over four years. So, we’re gonna see massive foreign capital coming in here, creating jobs. The gross domestic product is going to take off with tax cuts and deregulation. I know Kevin Warsh, he’s a wonderful, professional economist, colleague of mine at the Hoover Institution, he’s absolutely independent, but he will look at this empirically in a way that his predecessor did not. And he will see that there is a lot of growth and there has been a lot—GDP’s up to 5.5, but the inflation rate has gone down. And he will cut interest rates, not radically, but insidiously and continually. And you put all that together and it’s gonna really make a big difference if the president and his team talk about it daily and compare it to the Biden disaster. The other thing is Trump’s biggest asset was immigration. He stopped it. He didn’t curtail it. He stopped illegal immigration. They said that was impossible, comprehensive immigration—no, he didn’t need any of that. He just followed the law. But now he’s getting these bad optics and these blue enclaves where it’s organized, the opposition is organized by left-wing money, Antifa, etc. And they want Immigration and Customs Enforcement to be portrayed as Nazis, they want to dox them. So, ICE wears masks. And you know the whole story. They’re looking, they want to encourage people, they being elected officials—Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. They want people to go out and confront them, and they actually want people to be hurt or worse, to be martyrs. Why not just stay in places like we saw last week in West Virginia? Four hundred or 500 criminals rounded up. People who are happy. Law enforcement, both state, county, and local, complied. Not in the news, except the dividends that it’s a safer place and the law was enforced. Doesn’t mean you’re going to neglect the blue states. You’re just going to until the midterms. Look at places like Arkansas or Wyoming or Montana. Just look at places where you have a receptive population and a compliant and cooperative law enforcement entity. And that will give you great publicity that there’s no violence, there’s no protest, but you’re deporting thousands of criminals. And if you go into a criminal enclave and there happens to be somebody there and you say, I have, by law, I have to ask you what’s your status, and he is here illegally, then deport them. Doesn’t mean you have to neglect the law. There’s another advantage that Trump has. They’ve raised, I think, $90 to $100 million. They’ve out-raised the Left by three or four times. And the billionaire class of Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, not to mention Marc Andreessen or Elon Musk, they have defected, and it’s really hurting the Democrats. What they’re looking at in California with this billionaire’s tax, you can be a billionaire and have property and investments, homes, but you might only have, I don’t know, $100 million. They’re gonna take $50 million from you on your aggregate worth. That’s not gonna go over well with the billionaire class. And there, that’s just a foretaste of what Kamala Harris will do if she has a Democratic Congress. So, they’re gonna be able to raise more money, not just from the rank-and-file MAGA people, but from the donor class, which has been historically Democratic. And finally, there’s known unknowns. We’re at the precipice of radical things that are going on in Ukraine and the Middle East. They could be very bad, but they could also be very good. Mostly, foreign policy does not change a midterm election unless it is dramatic, fundamental, and a peace in Ukraine where you’re not getting 10,000 or 20,000 people killed and wounded a week, total casualties, not just fatalities, or you see that Iran’s government is overthrown and there’s a popular uprising where the United States is not seen as it was in Iraq as an invading foreign occupier, but as a helper of popular descent, that could be enormous. Just to review, there’s a lot of pros that could disrupt the historical cycle and see the Republicans hang onto the Congress. But there’s a lot of dangers, and you can go over the cliff if you continue to go into places like Minnesota, where they don’t want you, and you don’t really want to be there, but you feel obligated. I can understand that. But do that after the midterms. And the same thing is true—ignore what history says. This is a whole new ball game. We’ve never seen politics like this, and you can win the midterms even though you’re an incumbent president. And don’t make errors that don’t need to be made. Just put a czar on social media and say anything that comes through to the public from social media, from the Cabinet, has to be looked at first. Put Don Jr. in it. Put Eric. Just tell him somebody has to be responsible so this doesn’t get out and lose constituencies that won you the election in 2024. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Trump, Beware—These ‘Unforced Errors’ Could Hand Democrats a Midterm Win appeared first on The Daily Signal.