'They hate you, want to castrate your kids and they hate God and the truth'

State Sen. Jim Walsh, who represents the Longview area, is in the hot seat for a GOP a campaign text message that brings gender politics to a new low

An unedited version of this story went out prematurely. Here is the final, edited version.

Even by the repugnant standards of political modern campaigning, state Rep. Jim Walsh and the state GOP have crossed a line of decency.

The Friday before Tuesday’s general election, the Washington State Republican Party sent Spanish language text messages to voters in the Yakima/Goldendale area alleging that three Democratic candidates there want to “eliminate the Spanish language” and “support the chemical castration of your children in school without your knowledge or consent.”

“They hate you, they hate your family, they hate God and they hate the truth,” the message said, referring to three Latina Democrats running in the majority-Hispanic 14th legislative district, according to the Spokesman-Review newspaper, which published the story on election day.

The 14th District straddles the Yakima Valley and mid-Columbia River area. Its boundaries were redrawn by a federal judge — over GOP opposition — to resolve a legal battle over the electoral power of Latino voters. The three Republican contestants won the election, nevertheless.

The Spanish-language message claims that Democratic candidates Maria Beltran, Ana Ruiz Kennedy and Chelsea Dimas “reject God’s design of two genders and want to confuse your children about whether they are boys or girls.”

Walsh, of Aberdeen, is the statewide GOP chairman, so he knows that his own party’s anti-immigrant campaign messaging has described Latino emigres as rapists, murders and drug traffickers. So who who really hates whom here?

This message is as grossly duplicitous as it is disgusting and false.

What’s worse, Walsh is defending it. He told the Spokane paper that the assertions that Democrats support “chemical castration” was based on their responses to a Planned Parenthood survey, where they indicated support for transgender teenagers using drugs known as puberty blockers.

One such drug, Lupron, is a synthetic hormone also used to treat prostate and breast cancer. In some states, it is used to chemically castrate sex offenders.

“Nothing in the Democrats’ overwrought reactions denies the factual truth of the text messages,” Walsh told the Spokesman Review, defending the claim that Democrats hate families and God. “How else do you characterize the administration of Lupron to minors?

(Under state law, school cannot administer any medicatioon to students without the written consent of a parent or legal guardian. However, minors seeking gender-affirming care in Washington are protected from the intervention of estranged parents under a law Gov. Jay Inslee signed last year.) 

“Why is it OK for the left to accuse us of hate speech, but somehow questionable for us to point out that their actions, the actions of these candidates, show a hatred toward conventional families and traditional notions of gender identity?” Walsh asked.

Sorry Jim, this is just too far off the wall. Supporting transgender youth is helping someone cope with a gender crisis. It is an act of mercy. It is not a broad assault on traditional families, parents or God. In the Christian canon, God loves everyone — not just Republicans.

Walsh’s action has nothing to do with the need to do a better job of controlling illegal immigration at the southern border, most of which is driven by poverty and political terror. It is, however, a plain violation of rules of decency and sowing of hatred. It is disgusting.

State Sen. Curtis King, an incumbent Republican challenged by Beltran, took exception to the text messages — even though it’s from his own party on his behalf.

King issued a statement Monday saying he “very strongly” disavows the state GOP’s text message and he “knew nothing about it nor its content before it was sent.”

“In my 17-year political career, I have never made comments like those about any political opponent, whether on the campaign trail or on the Senate floor,” King said. “I believe my ability to work across the aisle with Democrat senators is testament to that.”

Beltran also took strong exception to the texts.

“They accuse me of awful, flatly untrue things and disrespect my Catholic faith and Mexican heritage,” she wrote, according to the Spokesman-Review. “While I’ve run an informed, issue-based campaign to get our community the leadership we deserve, King and his allies have constantly lied, tried to manipulate our community, and personally attacked me rather than engage in real, truthful, debate. This kind of cheap, egregious personal attack is what makes people in our district want to tune out of politics, and the Republican Party should be ashamed of engaging in it.”

Amen.

These texts are a particularly heinous example of hate politics. Voters on both sides are sick of it; both sides practice it. Progressives and Democrats are just as faithful as conservatives and love America just as much, even if they have different ideas about how to “make it great.”

Walsh on Tuesday was re-elected to a fifth two-year term representing the 19th District, which includes Longview and a six-county area stretching west to Long Beach and north to Aberdeen.

As a Catholic — I was raised one, too — Walsh should know that a prime message of Christianity is to love your neighbor and to make peace with your enemies. These Yakima texts are a wicked violation of that command. If he thinks that America is a Christian nation— as many conservative Republicans do —he should start behaving like he lives in one.

There is an interesting side note to this use of Spanish in a campaign. The state’s rising ethnic diversity may be prodding the political parties to reach out to voters in languages other than English.

In Clark County for example, the campaign of Democratic Congresswoman Marie Gluesenkamp Perez published a flier written in both Russian and English attacking her Republican challenger, Joe Kent, for his pro-Russian/pro Putin stance on the Ukraine war.

It was targeted at Vancouver’s growing community of Ukrainian emigres and was written by Mikhail Pavenko, who identifies himself as an emigre and friend of the congresswoman.

About 3,000 Ukrainians have settled in Clark County since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, according to the Vancouver Columbian. Even before the war, the Portland-Vancouver area was the the seventh-highest U.S. recipient of Ukrainian immigrants from 2015 to 2019, with 13,000 arriving, according to the Columbian, quoting the Migration Policy Institute.

Whatever the language of campaign advertising, there’s an ethical difference between calling a candidate wrongheaded and misinformed and calling them evil or questioning their faith.

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