• Outside of CNN’s LGBTQ town hall, deadly violence against trans people was discussed only eight times for a total of 18 minutes and 23 seconds of coverage during corporate broadcast and cable evening news programs. 

• Democratic presidential candidates and audience members at CNN’s October 10 town hall discussed anti-trans violence an additional five times for a total of 15 minutes and 2 seconds of coverage.

• Including the town hall and all other discussion, anti-trans violence was discussed for 33 minutes and 25 seconds during evening news coverage in 2019.

• NBC’s nightly news show and MSNBC’s evening news programs failed to cover anti-trans violence a single time in 2019.

• Including its town hall, CNN devoted the most evening coverage to anti-trans violence out of the networks examined, with a total of 27 minutes and 30 seconds. This was four times more coverage than all other networks combined.

• Evening cable and broadcast TV news did not include a single openly trans person as a guest to discuss anti-trans violence. 

• Only four of the 13 total segments mentioned the name of a slain trans person.

• In the network’s sole segment discussing anti-trans violence, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson politicized the issue in order to suggest that Democrats were becoming too extreme on trans issues. He did not actually address alarming rates of violence.

• Though we did not include PBS in the full data set, we analyzed its coverage as a comparison point; episodes of PBS NewsHour's weekday and weekend edition reported on anti-trans violence for 9 minutes and 17 seconds, more than all of the corporate broadcast networks’ coverage combined.

In 2019, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) named at least 25 transgender or gender-nonconforming people who were brutally killed in the U.S. At least 21 of them were Black trans women, and another was a Black gender-nonconforming person; the Williams Institute estimates that 16% of the 1.4 million transgender adults in the U.S. identify as African-American or Black, making the rate of killings of Black trans women considerably higher than the murder rate in the United States. A 2016 report by Mic estimated that the murder rate for young Black trans women in the U.S. is 1 in 2,600, which is four times higher than the murder rate for young adults (1 in 12,000 at the time). The rise in anti-trans violence has become so grave that it prompted the American Medical Association to create a plan to bring national attention to the issue.

The 25 transgender or gender-nonconforming people who HRC reported were killed in 2019 were:

• Jamagio Jamar Berryman, Muhlaysia Booker, Paris Cameron, Ashanti Carmon, Jordan Cofer, Pebbles LaDime “Dime” Doe, Kiki Fantroy, Brianna “BB” Hill, Nikki Kuhnhausen, Claire Legato, Brooklyn Lindsey, Chynal Lindsey, Itali Marlowe, Dana Martin, Yahira Nesby, Bailey Reeves, Chanel Scurlock, Tracy Single, Bee Love Slater, Zoe Spears, Denali Berries Stuckey, Jazzaline Ware, Michelle “Tamika” Washington, Bubba Walker, and Ellie Marie Washtock.

Many of these killings were particularly gruesome. Bubba Walker’s body was found “burned beyond recognition” in an abandoned home in Charlotte, North Carolina. Tracy Single was found stabbed to death in a gas station parking lot in Houston, Texas. And Muhlaysia Booker was fatally shot one month after being “assaulted in broad daylight be a group of men in Dallas.” 

Moreover, 19 of the victims died of gun violence. Everytown for Gun Safety has said that “transgender violence is a gun violence issue” and found that “three out of four of transgender homicides since 2017 were gun deaths,” according to NewNowNext. Additionally, the number of trans people killed each year is likely underreported, with one study noting that “in the United States there is no formal data collection effort that can be used to describe the nature, frequency, or extent of transgender homicides.” 

Meanwhile, the FBI has reported that hate crimes targeting trans people are at an all-time high. Over the past year, trans people in the U.S. were shot, kicked in the head, pepper sprayed, severely beaten while using the restroom, attacked while working, and “blasted with black exhaust” while at a Transgender Day of Visibility event. The trans community, particularly Black trans people, face rampant discrimination in employment, housing, and health care. These discriminatory social conditions contribute to the community’s already high risks of suicide and violence, which also disproportionately impact Black trans people, and are crucial context in conversations around the killings of trans folks.

Media Matters reviewed nightly news shows on corporate broadcast networks ABC, CBS, and NBC and evening news programming between 5 p.m. and midnight on cable channels CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC in 2019. During that time frame, we found that those networks spent a total of 33 minutes and 25 seconds discussing anti-trans violence, though 15 minutes and 2 seconds of that coverage occurred over five segments during a single night of programming at CNN’s first-ever LGBTQ town hall.

At the October 10 town hall, Democratic presidential candidates took part in half-hour-long interviews focused on LGBTQ rights and policy. Excluding the town hall, evening news discussed the topic for only 18 minutes and 23 seconds in eight different segments over the course of the year.

Outside of that evening, CNN devoted an additional 12 minutes and 28 seconds of discussion to anti-trans violence over four segments, more than twice the amount of coverage from all the other networks combined. Of the other two cable networks’ evening news programming, Fox News discussed the subject for 52 seconds across one segment, while MSNBC did not cover it at all.

Corporate broadcast networks ABC, CBS, and NBC each air a 30-minute nightly news show: ABC’s World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, and NBC Nightly News. These shows also have weekend counterparts. ABC’s nightly news show reported on anti-trans violence for 1 minute and 53 seconds in one segment on its weekend edition, and CBS’ nightly show discussed it for 3 minutes and 10 seconds across two segments, one during its weekend program and one during the week. NBC Nightly News did not address the topic in 2019. 

The quality and breadth of evening news coverage of anti-trans violence in 2019 varied across networks. 

A few highlights include:

• CNN’s LGBTQ town hall was the only corporate broadcast or cable evening news programming in 2019 to have an openly trans guest discuss anti-trans violence. Two trans people asked questions about the issue as part of the town hall, and in another instance during the event, Blossom C. Brown, a Black trans woman, had to grab the microphone to ask about it. 

• None of the networks’ segments on anti-trans violence deadnamed or misgendered any of the victims. Deadnaming, or referring to a transgender person using their “birth name” rather than their current name, is a disrespectful practice that goes against journalistic standards.

• Only four of the 13 segments included in the data set -- two from CBS and one each from ABC and CNN -- actually said the name of a trans person who was killed in 2019. 

• The only time Fox News discussed anti-trans violence was during a segment in which Tucker Carlson re-aired parts of CNN’s LGBTQ town hall. Rather than report on the issue, Carlson and his guest, Turning Point USA’s Rob Smith, focused the discussion around supposed Democratic extremism.

The dearth of reporting from most evening TV news -- outside of CNN --about anti-trans violence in 2019 was not due to a lack of reporting from other media outlets. Rather, It is clear that evening news programs have the capacity to report on the topic but broadly chose not to. LGBTQ outlets and verticals, public broadcasting, and local and national media have reported extensively on the subject. 

As a comparison point, Media Matters examined coverage on PBS’ nightly news show, PBS NewsHour, and its weekend edition, but did not include the network in the full data set due to significant differences in show and network format. In 2019, PBS outperformed the corporate networks in reporting on anti-trans violence, with 9 minutes and 17 seconds of coverage across three segments. One segment was an in-depth report on the topic that highlighted several Black trans women who had been killed. Anti-trans violence was also discussed in two other PBS NewsHour segments: one in an interview with Eduardo Bolsonaro, the son of Brazil’s far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, and another in a panel discussion that featured the Rev. Emma Chattin, a trans advocate and educator.

Though NBC Nightly News and MSNBC’s evening news programs did not address the topic in 2019, NBC News’ online vertical dedicated to LGBTQ issues, NBC Out, produced numerous reports on anti-trans violence. Notably, an NBC Out story by Kate Sosin highlighted the murders of Black trans women in Dallas, Texas, and noted that LGBTQ advocates say issues like “unemployment, limited educational opportunities, housing insecurity and high medical expenses” are related to the distressing rates of anti-trans violence.

It is clear that evening news programs have the capacity to report on the topic but broadly chose not to. Networks including ABC, CNN, and MSNBC produced some notable programming, including on daytime, that provided solid reporting on violence against the trans community in 2019, but evening news programs are viewed by millions more. For instance, ABC’s late-night program Nightline ran multiple segments that covered anti-trans violence, including an in-depth segment on the topic featuring Monica Roberts, a trans advocate who runs the blog TransGriot, and Pose star Dominique Jackson. 

Roberts has led efforts to correctly identify and report on the deaths of trans women, as many local police departments fail to identify victims by their correct name and gender. As Samantha Allen reported at the Daily Beast, “Whenever you read about the transgender people killed in any given year, it’s in large part due to the work Roberts does. National LGBT advocacy organizations and mainstream news outlets alike rely on her as an early source of information.” 

Insufficient reporting on anti-trans violence is one major reflection of the larger failure in TV news to report on the issues facing the already marginalized trans community. And in the absence of meaningful reporting on trans issues, right-wing media can spread vile misinformation and dominate coverage of the topic. Evening TV news programs reach tens of millions of viewers a night and have a responsibility to inform their viewers with accurate coverage about the rise in anti-trans violence.

Charts by John Whitehouse.

Media Matters searched broadcast and cable news transcripts in Nexis from January 1 through December 31, 2019, for shows that aired between 5 p.m. and midnight on CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC, as well as transcripts of corporate broadcast nightly news programs -- ABC’s World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, and their weekend counterparts -- for mentions of the words or variations of the words “transgender,” “trans,” “transsexual,” “transphobe,” “transphobia,” “gender identity,” “gender nonconforming,” or “gender fluid” occurring within 100 words of the terms or variations of the terms “violence,” “crime,” “hate,” “attack,” “homicide,” “shoot,” “shot,” “murder,” “death,” “die,” “dead,” “kill,” “stab,” “strangle,” or “burn.” As a comparison point, we also searched transcripts of PBS’ nightly news program, PBS NewsHour, and its weekend edition for the same terms.

We also searched for the names of the at least 25 transgender and gender-nonconforming people who were killed in 2019: Jamagio Jamar Berryman, Muhlaysia Booker, Paris Cameron, Ashanti Carmon, Jordan Cofer, Pebbles LaDime “Dime” Doe, Kiki Fantroy, Brianna “BB” Hill, Nikki Kuhnhausen, Claire Legato, Brooklyn Lindsey, Chynal Lindsey, Itali Marlowe, Dana Martin, Yahira Nesby, Bailey Reeves, Chanel Scurlock, Tracy Single, Bee Love Slater, Zoe Spears, Denali Berries Stuckey, Jazzaline Ware, Michelle 'Tamika' Washington, Bubba Walker, and Ellie Marie Washtock.

Jordan Cofer was killed during the August 4 mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio. Four days after the shooting, Splinter News reported that Cofer had come out to a few friends as transgender; none of the cable or broadcast coverage of his death noted his gender identity or was about anti-trans violence.

Early police reports and local coverage often referred to victims by their deadnames. We also searched for the deadnames of the 2019 victims but have not listed those names here as deadnaming is a form of harassment.

We included segments about anti-trans violence, which we defined as instances where anti-trans violence was the stated topic of discussion or where there was significant discussion of anti-trans violence. We defined “significant discussion” as any back-and-forth exchange between two or more people; passing mentions were not included in the analysis. We excluded teasers, which we defined as short mentions from the host of segments coming up later in the broadcast.