As the 2022 midterms approach, One America News Network is talking to members of Congress about what might be done if Republicans take control of the House and Senate. In particular, the network is continuing its bigoted approach to trans people, with OAN talent and guests suggesting that a GOP Congress could pass legislation to ban what one deemed “creepy sex stuff.”

The targets are clear: OAN’s agenda for a GOP Congress is to investigate President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden, investigate Dr. Anthony Fauci, ban gender-affirming care, and more. 

For OAN, the stakes are dire. In a report that labeled the January 6 insurrection “the new Reichstag fire for the Democrats,” OAN’s Pearson Sharp warned that “we have to wake up before the Democrats can put the next step of their plan into action and Biden's jack-booted storm troopers start rounding up his enemies and sending them off to camps.”

OAN asks what can a Republican Congress do to change America

In a September interview with OAN D.C. bureau chief John Hines, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) claimed that Fauci is resigning in December “because he fears scrutiny” over COVID-19 origins, and vaccine research, but “we don’t plan on letting him escape that scrutiny.” Hines asked if Republicans would “be inviting him back, perhaps subpoenaing” him if they win the Senate, and Paul confirmed that “there’s going to be a lot -- I can envision dozens of hearings on this.”

On In Focus, Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) discussed his call for a Department of Justice investigation of a White House clean energy adviser’s alleged relationship with the Chinese Communist Party. He admitted that it’s “probably not” going to happen because, he claimed, the Biden administration “is selling out to China,” but added that “when we take over, this will be one of the first things we try to defund.” Host Addison Smith predicted that OAN would support the effort, because “we represent the American people, and the American people don’t want $370 billion going to fight the sun monster.”

On October 1, OAN’s chief White House correspondent Chanel Rion asked Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-WI) if there was “momentum behind righting the ship” in the upcoming Congress. When “we get the majority back in the House,” Tiffany replied, energy independence is “going to be one of day one’s job,” suggesting renewal of the Keystone XL pipeline and discouragement of alternative energies that “the green fantasy people want us to” use.

In a later interview with Rep. James Comer (R-KY), Hines said that Comer had emphasized that his “committee is ready to go, on day one in January, should [Republicans] take the House” and noted that the House oversight committee -- which Comer would be expected to chair if Republicans take the chamber -- can “issue subpoenas without the approval of minority members.” Comer confirmed that he would have broad subpoena power and “we’re going to try to start holding this administration accountable” with investigations into COVID-19 origination, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and Hunter Biden. 

In the wake of Biden’s comment that “the pandemic is over,” Hines also spoke with Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) to promote his proposed bill to end a requirement for landlords to give tenants 30 days’ notice before beginning eviction proceedings. Having cast the regulation as “a plan on the part of your progressive brethren” to “federalize” local issues, Hines specifically noted that “if the GOP is successful in retaking the House in November, we may see this piece of legislation introduced once again.”

OAN targetes trans people for punishment to boost Republican support

Although OAN discusses a raft of issues and grievances in light of the midterms, including “Biden’s border crisis” and predicted Democratic election fraud, few topics are as prominent as OAN’s hatred for transgender people. With November approaching, voices on the network have spread transphobic misinformation about gender-affirming care to support the GOP’s midterm odds, although in reality access to this care is critical for mental health, and denying it can be deadly. Furthermore, while most gender-affirming care is nonsurgical, those who do have surgeries rarely regret it. 

During Norman’s September 26 In Focus appearance, he also promoted the so-called Protect Children’s Innocence Act, a federal attempt to ban gender-affirming care, which Norman termed “castration, mutilization [mutilation],” and “a crime,” along with spreading other anti-trans misinformation. In response, host Smith absurdly suggested that there is a broad conspiracy among hospitals, therapists, and teachers to turn children transgender. 

On September 28, In Focus returned to targeting trans people, asking failed Pennsylvania Senate candidate Kathy Barnette about “woke school boards, “radical gender theory,” and the midterms. Barnette replied by attacking trans-supportive teachers and education, which Smith mischaracterized as “creepy sex stuff,” and she claimed that the anti-trans hysteria fed by right-wing media is “driving parents who don’t generally identify as Republican” to vote Republican. 

“What the Republican Party needs to do is stop tiptoeing into November and begin to be very loud about these issues,” Barnette advised, “because the culture is shifting on these particular topics.”

On October 5, Real America host Dan Ball began a segment with the misleading complaint that three medical associations asked the Department of Justice “to investigate, even prosecute, any parents, any journalists, any Americans who are concerned” about gender-affirming care. Ball eventually admitted that the request concerned violent threats against doctors, “but you know what this means,” he warned, before comparing the letter to similar false claims of the FBI prosecuting parents as “domestic terrorists” over critical race theory -- another false right-wing media hysteria. 

Gender-affirming care is an “outright assault on our children,” Ball raved, “and if you don’t wake the hell up right now and start making some noise, it’s going to be too late.” His guest, podcaster Quisha King, added her prayers “that we take over in the House and the Senate this coming election, and that parents continue to stand up and fight for their kids, because truly, Dan, we are in the fight of our lives.” Ball then promised to slap any parent he meets who supports gender-affirming care: “They’re butchering, they’re mutilating our kids. … This has to be, we draw the line in the sand, this is our last stand.”