(LifeSiteNews) – The conservative American Principles Project (APP) unveiled its closing ad Monday against Mark Kelly, the Democrat incumbent for one of Arizona’s seats in the U.S. Senate, putting faces to the victims of Democrats’ transgender policies.
The ad highlights the story of Yaeli Martinez, a 19-year-old girl who committed suicide in 2019, as told by her heartbroken mother Abby. Yaeli suffered from depression in high school and was set on the path of “gender identity” as a possible answer by a gender-confused friend, an LGBT club, and even a school counselor who supported her decision to begin socially transitioning – without notifying her mother.
Our closing ad in the 2022 election attacks the central argument for transgenderism — that sex changes and hormone treatments “save lives” — they don’t. In fact — transgenderism is killing our kids and Democrats like @CaptMarkKelly is part of the problem. pic.twitter.com/rOXNnk3mAz
— Terry Schilling 🇺🇸 (@Schilling1776) October 24, 2022
Yaeli left home at 16, when the Los Angeles County Department of Children & Family Services (DCFS) stripped Abby of custody based on her voicing concerns about her daughter’s transitioning.
“She was taking the [cross-sex] hormones; she was not happy,” Abby said. “She changed her name, [but] was not happy. She adopted a dog because that was going to make her happy. None of it, everything that they’ve done, didn’t work.”
When Yaeli took her own life after trying to live as a man for three years, Abby confronted DCFS, which she says “didn’t care” about her ongoing depression: “Where is my daughter? You took her away from me, my family. Now she’s gone. You told me that she was going to be better off.”
“Democrats like Mark Kelly are pushing dangerous transgender drugs and surgeries on kids, taking away parental rights,” the APP ad says. “Transgenderism is killing kids. Mark Kelly is part of the problem.”
Kelly is a co-sponsor of the so-called “Equality Act,” which would amend the 1964 Civil Rights Act to include “sex,” “sexual orientation,” and “gender identity” among expressly recognized “non-discrimination” categories in “public accommodations” (the definition of which would be dramatically expanded). It would also force employers of 15 or more people to recognize their claimed “gender identity,” forbid them from “discriminating” based on “sexual orientation” or “gender identity,” and mandate transgender “access” to sex-specific facilities.
Conservatives argue that the bill, which has the backing of President Joe Biden, would not merely protect homosexual or gender-confused Americans from actual harm but rather force religious adoption agencies to place children in same-sex homes; force the likes of photographers, florists, and bakers to participate in same-sex “weddings”; force employers and businesses to accommodate cross-dressing and sex-change treatments regardless of their own values or policies; and force women and girls to share sleeping quarters, showers, changing areas, restrooms, and sex-specific athletic competitions with gender-confused males.
As politicians undermine trans rights here in Arizona and across the country, it couldn’t be more important to celebrate trans people and stand with them in the fight for full equality.
On this #TransgenderDayOfVisibility, know that I've got your back.
— Captain Mark Kelly (@CaptMarkKelly) March 31, 2022
The APP ad emphasizes the stakes of the impending midterm congressional elections and will likely help allay lingering conservative hesitance about Kelly’s Republican opponent Blake Masters, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump yet aggravated pro-lifers in August by softening his official abortion rhetoric.