The Complexities of Trans Gun Ownership

As the culture wars erupt into violent extremism, “gender ideology”—which the Trump Administration defines as “the idea that there is a vast spectrum of genders that are disconnected from one’s sex”—has gone from being seen as “woke” to being framed by members of the political right as one of the sources of America’s evils, including its violence. Most violence, political or otherwise, is not perpetrated by trans people. In fact, trans people are four times more likely than cisgender people to be victims of violent crime. Yet right-wing commentators have fixated on two incidents involving shooters who were described by authorities as trans—a mass shooting at the Covenant School, in Nashville, in 2023, and the more recent shooting at Annunciation Catholic School, in Minneapolis—as evidence of “trans terrorism,” in the words of the Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh. The Heritage Foundation, the right-wing think tank responsible for Project 2025, recently issued a call for the F.B.I. to designate “Transgender Ideology-Inspired Violent Extremism” as a domestic terror threat. In both the case of the Nashville shooting and the Minneapolis attack, authorities have not shared any evidence indicating that the shooters’ respective gender identities drove their horrific actions. There was widespread speculation that the shooter at the Covenant School, who had previously been a student there, was motivated by anti-religious resentment. But an investigation conducted by the Metro Nashville Police Department concluded that the shooter, who had enjoyed their time at the school, had been motivated by fame.

Almost immediately after Charlie Kirk was killed in Utah, three weeks ago, conservative figures began speculating that the shooter was either trans or had murdered Kirk because of his anti-trans rhetoric. (Kirk was talking about trans mass shooters just before he was shot.) Republicans quickly consolidated Democrats, Antifa, and trans people into one radical enemy. “I mean, give me a fucking break,” the congresswoman Nancy Mace said on Capitol Hill. “This guy’s talking about mass trans violence, tranny violence—I’m not going to filter myself—and got shot in the neck like that.” The day after Kirk’s death, the Wall Street Journal reported that the ammunition used in the shooting had been engraved with expressions of transgender “ideology”—a claim that was refuted by Utah’s governor, Spencer Cox, and that the Journal later walked back. First, conservatives said the shooter was trans; then they said the bullets were trans. Now they’ve seized on reports that Tyler Robinson, the suspect in custody, had a trans partner or roommate. As always, their aims are a moving target, with a common enemy.

The issue of minority gun ownership has long been fraught. In 1857, Chief Justice Roger Taney argued in Dred Scott v. Sandford that Black people should not be recognized as citizens because it would give them the right “to keep and carry arms wherever they want.” Even after Black people became citizens entitled to Second Amendment rights, they often had to deal with discriminatory gun laws limiting their access to firearms. Despite his house being firebombed in 1956, Martin Luther King, Jr., was unable to obtain a concealed-carry permit. Because of this, guns would ultimately become a key component of the Black Power movement. Activists carried guns for community patrols, self-defense, and as a show of force. In May, 1967, the Black Panthers entered the California Capitol Building with shotguns, pistols, and rifles to protest stricter gun-control laws. In recent years, Black and L.G.B.T.Q. gun ownership has been on the rise, with individuals in both groups citing the marked increase in hate crimes as a primary motivator for arming themselves in self-defense.

Many trans gun owners I spoke with were anxious about the Administration potentially limiting their access to firearms. “The trans people I know, both gun owners and others, see the prospect of the D.O.J. taking trans people’s guns as a prelude to atrocity,” Eden Fenn, a young trans woman, told me. She called herself “the definition of a reluctant gun owner,” describing her ownership as a precautionary measure against the potential of anti-trans violence. Similarly, Margaret Killjoy, a trans musician and writer, told me that she obtained a gun permit after being doxed by far-right extremists.

I’m not a gun owner, but I understand the instinct: after the shooting at Pulse night club, in 2016, it occurred to me that I might want to learn how to use a gun for my own protection. It took me several years to overcome my squeamishness, and I finally went to a gun range for the first time this past summer. Aside from the employees staffing the front desk, I was the only woman there. My instructor told me to be careful of gunshot residue, since I was showing slightly more skin than the men in camouflage and hockey jerseys next to me. Over all, it was a surprisingly mundane outing. I fired a few rounds and then I left.

Both Killjoy and Fenn said that visiting gun ranges has become an increasingly charged experience for them. (“I’ve gotten a lot of weird looks but no outright hostility so far,” Fenn told me.) Killjoy said that she was heartened by the N.R.A. expressing support for everyone maintaining the ability to own guns, even if she doesn’t endorse the more right-wing aspects of the organization’s agenda. She sees guns as a “tiny part” of community organizing and safety, alongside mutual-aid groups and fund-raisers. Killjoy, who lives in rural Appalachia, said that most of the people she knows who are anti-gun live in cities or in the suburbs. “In the country, a gun is a fundamentally different symbol,” she said, “a symbol of self-reliance.” She said that she hopes we can change what gun culture looks like in the U.S.; the focus should be less on sensationalism and more on gun safety and community preparedness. “I believe that changing what gun culture looks like is the more useful way to make gun ownership a less dangerous thing, and a thing where it’s less stigmatized and less associated with the right wing,” she told me.

The debate over trans gun ownership is especially complicated in the context of the larger push by progressives for widespread gun control. Even someone who is steadfast in their support of trans rights might find it hard to advocate for trans gun ownership if they believe in limiting access to guns more broadly. But as R.K., a trans gun owner in Philadelphia, said of the D.O.J.’s conversations, “It’s not about gun control. It’s about removing trans people’s autonomy.” It is impossible to separate this action from the Administration’s larger assault on trans rights and trans health care. R.K. noted that their friends have seen an increase in street harassment since around the time of the Presidential election last year. “The reason I own a gun is not because of a moral standpoint, but because of a simple necessity,” they said. “I’m just responding to the conditions I see in front of me.” Given that Trump has mobilized the military in cities like Chicago and Washington, D.C., and used agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement to crack down on activists, R.K. is worried about the Administration going after trans people in a similar manner. “I think the way ICE has been disappearing people is really scary,” they said. “These are people in my community, in real life. I worry about that turning toward us and accelerating so fast.”

For other members of the trans community, owning a gun is not only a source of protection but a form of gender affirmation. One young trans man told me that he grew up in a liberal household in Pennsylvania, where his parents were vehemently anti-gun. After a terrifying series of attempted break-ins, though, he decided to buy his first firearm. Eventually, he moved to a new city, in Texas, and transitioned. There, he said, “having a gun made me feel more like a man than I realized it would. It is something so ingrained in Texas culture that it helped me to hide in plain sight.” From the start, he has been adamant about gun safety; when he first thought of learning how to shoot, his neighbor taught him how to clear jams and clean his weapon, as well as techniques for proper maintenance. He compared guns to cars, framing them as everyday tools that pose risks: “If the person driving the car is not being a responsible driver, people can and will get hurt.” (Ninety-two per cent of households own a car, and about half have a gun, but the number of deaths from cars and guns annually is roughly the same.)

Of course, gun safety is not only an issue of physical protection; mental health plays a role, too. Mental health is often weaponized against the trans community, with politicians such as Ronny Jackson, the congressman from Texas who once served as Trump’s Presidential physician, calling for the mass institutionalization of trans people, characterizing anyone who changes their sex as mentally ill. Despite these bad-faith attacks, there are legitimate concerns about the high rates of depression and suicidal ideation among trans people, which many of the trans gun owners I spoke with acknowledged. They expressed a desire to have a more candid conversation about maintaining emotional-wellness plans in order to responsibly possess firearms. Everyone I spoke with talked about their gun-safety plans. Some suggested that it should be normalized to offload your guns to a friend while going through a traumatic experience. All gun owners must balance the possible danger that their guns may bring to themselves and to others, whether they’re trans or cis, and whether or not they’re prone to depression. There are no easy answers—only a delicate calculus to be made. To those who are wary of trans gun ownership, R.K. offered a simple admonishment: build better material conditions for trans people, a world where they can feel safe without arming themselves. “I just need to see people step up and not pretend like it’s a problem that’s not happening.” 

The Complexities of Trans Gun Ownership | The New Yorker