Insiders: Ohio Democratic Party is censoring anti-trans ads criticism

Ohio Democrats are accusing their own party leadership of removing social media posts that pushed back on anti-trans ads released by Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur, who is running for re-election in the 9th Congressional District in Northwest Ohio.

Kaptur released two anti-transgender political ads last week, just weeks ahead of Ohio’s contentious Nov. 3 election. The first ad, posted to the social media site X, features Kaptur saying that she “voted with Republicans to keep transgender ideology out of our schools, because parents know what’s best for their kids – and boys should not play in girls’ sports.”

In the second ad, Kaptur speaks to her own record breaking ranks with the Democratic party, including saying “no to teaching gender ideology in schools.”

The national LGBTQ+ media monitoring nonprofit GLAAD has called use of the term “gender ideology” an anti-transgender dogwhistle, describing it as “a malicious rhetorical construct that falsely asserts that LGBTQ – notably trans – people are an ideological movement rather than an intrinsic identity.”

The Lucas County Democrats was one of many groups to push back on the ads and publicly called on Kaptur to take the ad down.

The Pride Caucus – one of 10 caucuses of the ODP – shared that post on social media on September 23.

The post was deleted.

Later the same day, the Pride Caucus shared the post again as they didn’t know that the first post had been intentionally removed.

Within minutes, the post was again deleted.

Speaking as an advocate and not in her role as the vice-chair of the Pride Caucus, Ari Childrey told independent journalist Erin Reed that the ODP has access to the Pride Caucus’ social media accounts.

“There was no effort to even reach out to us initially by the ODP,” Childrey said. “They simply went into our social media and deleted the reshare. They are now requiring that the ODP have access to any of the internal caucuses’ social media.”

Another member of the Pride Caucus steering committee told The Buckeye Flame that ODP does not approve caucus posts that advocate against an endorsed candidate – like Kaptur – and that ODP does not have the same control over the posts of county parties.

“Sharing this [post] when the candidate has not opened the doors for any type of conversation behind-the-scenes is not even a criticism as much as it is asking the candidate to support the community,” Childrey told Erin in the Morning.

Neither ODP staff nor ODP party leadership responded to The Buckeye Flame’s multiple requests for comment. 🔥