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Every time I examine The Lavender Scare and its larger historical and societal context, I’m struck by how similar elements of it are to today’s anti-trans rhetoric. While contemporary anti-trans rhetoric and The Lavender Scare certainly aren’t identical, their parallels are important to examine. We need to study these similarities so we can understand how current beliefs and ideas espoused about transgender people weren’t created in a vacuum; the government has done something like this before.  

Before studying some of these parallels, though, we must begin with the basics of what The Lavender Scare actually was.  

The Basics of The Lavender Scare  

Before we step foot into the details surrounding The Lavender Scare, it’s important to understand McCarthyism, the period of time in American history in which US Senator Joseph McCarthy (WI) held investigations and hearings throughout the 1950s surrounding supposed communist infiltration in the government.

McCarthy believed that Communists as well as homosexuals had “peculiar mental twists” which caused deviant behavior. This is the belief that led to The Lavender Scare, essentially a 'witch hunt' for homosexual employees in federal jobs.

The Lavender Scare reached a fever pitch in 1950 with the US Senate subcommittee report titled ‘Employment of Homosexuals and Other Sex Perverts in Government.’ The report claimed that homosexuals were security risks and stated, “The primary objective of the subcommittee in this inquiry was to determine the extent of the employment of homosexuals and other sex perverts in Government; to consider reasons why their employment by the Government is undesirable; and to examine into the efficacy of the methods used in dealing with the problem.”

Then, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed Executive Order 10450 in 1953, it heightened The Lavender Scare even more. This executive order led to over 5,000 federal employees losing their jobs due to suspected homosexuality, and it barred many more applicants from government jobs.  

Increased Visibility  

The Lavender Scare came following an era where homosexuality was becoming more visible in the United States. Throughout World War II, many people left small towns for big cities for the first time, and after the war, there was an influx of young people headed to larger cities. In urban centers, the increased population led to anonymity and also allowed homosexuals to begin to find each other.  

It wasn’t just homosexuals finding each other; the larger American public was becoming more aware of homosexuality as well. In 1948, Alfred Kinsey published ‘Sexual Behavior in the Human Male,’ which was a bestseller, and it claimed that homosexual experiences were common.  

It was after this increased visibility began that the US government implemented these ‘witch hunts’ for homosexual federal workers, making wild claims about their supposed security threats. And as the years went on, The Lavender Scare heightened and heightened.  

Interestingly, regarding modern-day anti-transgender arguments, a similar pattern emerges. In 2014, Laverne Cox was on the cover of Time Magazine for the ‘Transgender Tipping Point’ story. Cox said, “We are in a place now where more and more trans people want to come forward and say, ‘This is who I am.’ And more trans people are willing to tell their stories. More of us are living visibly and pursuing our dreams visibly, so people can say, ‘Oh yeah, I know someone who is trans.’ When people have points of reference that are humanizing, that demystifies difference.” 

Around this time, numerous high-profile individuals came out as transgender, from Caitlyn Jenner to Sarah McBride, who became the first openly transgender individual to speak at a national political convention in 2016, and many others.  

Similar to what happened with The Lavender Scare, this increase in visibility led to governmental ‘witch hunts,’ but in this case, it looked like anti-trans legislation. Trans Legislation Tracker began tracking the legislation in 2015, and that year, 19 anti-trans bills were proposed; that number has increased exponentially, with over 1,000 bills proposed last year. The huge increase also mirrors the way The Lavender Scare intensified over the years.  

Security Threat Claims  

In 1950, Secretary of Commerce Charles Sawyer wrote, "The privilege of working for the United States Government should not be extended to persons of dubious moral character, such as homosexuals or sex perverts. The confidence of our citizenry in their Government would be severely taxed if we looked with tolerance upon the employment of such persons." 

In ‘Employment of Homosexuals and Other Sex Perverts in Government,’ the report concluded that homosexuals couldn’t be employed in any federal position mirroring Sawyer’s writing. One of the key points made in the report was the idea that homosexuals were inherently security risks, and they claimed that homosexuals were vulnerable to blackmail, even though they didn’t have great evidence to support this claim.  

Following similar logic, our current government is attempting to paint all transgender people as inherent security threats. According to the Trump administration's counterterrorism strategy, “Violent left-wing extremists” and “extremist transgender ideology” are among the most concerning threats facing the country. The strategy noted that, “In addition to cartels and Islamist terror groups, our national CT activities will also prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-transgender, and anarchist.” 

The Lemkin Institute shared their concerns regarding these developments, “The Administration has moved from identifying transgender people as a threat to the family and to the nation’s military prowess to claiming that transgender people constitute a cosmic threat to the spiritual health of the nation and the greatest direct threat to US national security in the world. Given these ideological developments, especially coupled with the increasingly hostile and draconian legislation against trans identities, the Lemkin Institute believes that the United States is squarely within the early to middle stages of a genocidal process against trans people, the goal of which is to completely erase transgender people not only from public life but also from existence in the US and globally.” 

While the exact beliefs that fueled The Lavender Scare aren’t the same as those driving politicians and their anti-trans rhetoric today, the idea that an entire small group of people could all be security risks and threats is eerily similar.  

Finding a Scapegoat

During his speech on the Senate floor, McCarthy highlighted two cases of homosexuals. “‘Case 14’ was, according to McCarthy, a known homosexual who had been ousted by the State Department but then rehired. In his discussion of that man and of ‘Case 62,’ McCarthy directly linked homosexuality and Communism.” For McCarthy, finding two cases that appeared to match his beliefs meant that all homosexuals employed in federal positions were threats.  

Today, we are witnessing a similar thing happen with claims surrounding transgender individuals and violence, especially regarding school shootings. The 19th reported, “The Heritage Foundation policy release wrongly asserts that ‘TIVE [Transgender Ideology-Inspired Violence and Extremism] has played a role in the majority of mass shootings at schools.’ While there have been instances of transgender individuals arrested for such shootings, including one in Minneapolis in August [2025], research by groups like FactCheck.org found the number of transgender shooting suspects was ‘exceedingly small.’” 

The 19th also noted that trans people make up less than one percent of mass shooters; mass shooters tend to be cisgender men, not transgender people. Transgender people are more likely to be victims of violence, rather than the perpetrators.  

These facts don’t stop the Trump Administration from publishing a release titled ‘President Trump Isn’t Backing Down from Crushing Radical Left Violence.’ In the release, three supposed instances of transgender violence are listed, and it’s clear that the administration is taking these few instances of alleged violence and equating them to the entire transgender community, just as McCarthy’s legislation did with homosexuals decades ago.  

Claims of Abuse  

During the McCarthy era, homosexuality’s increased visibility led to moral panic amongst the public and beliefs equating homosexuals with sex criminals. For example, in Iowa in 1954, two children were brutally murdered, and police tried to quell public panic by arresting 20 homosexual men who had no ties to the crimes. In Iowa during this time, homosexuals were lumped in with child molesters and murderers. Because of that, the men were sentenced to a mental institution until 'cured.' This one instance speaks to the larger public fears surrounding homosexuality during this time and the incorrect belief that every homosexual was a sexual criminal. 

These fears mirror the transgender bathroom bans that have been proposed and implemented. Government officials and the public propose this legislation under the guise of protecting women and children. And like the antiquated laws mentioned above, this modern legislation means that politicians are essentially lumping all transgender people in with sexual predators. Just like the homosexual moral panic, this has become almost a transgender moral panic.  

Conclusion 

Today we aren’t in The Lavender Scare, and what transgender people today are facing isn’t exactly the same as what happened decades ago. However, there are certainly historical parallels regarding claims of security threats following increased visibility to a minority group, claims of abuse, and using scapegoats to demonize an entire group. Understanding this historical precedent gives us context for what is happening now and can assist us as we fight back.  

If you’re curious to learn more parallels from historical anti-gay panics and today’s anti-trans panic, check out this article I published last year that looks at bathroom bans, military bans, and putting politics over science.