The pro-DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down released an ad on Wednesday hitting former President Donald Trump over his past support of transgender contestants competing against women in his Miss Universe pageant.
Trump has vowed to “defeat the cult of gender ideology” as he pursues a second term in the White House, but he had a very different position on the issue just a decade ago when he endorsed letting a man claiming to be a woman compete in the Miss Universe pageant that he owned at the time. Referring to 23-year-old Canadian Jenna Talaackova as a “woman,” Trump said the contest should be open to men who identify as women.
“I talk about transgender, everyone goes crazy,” Trump says at the start of the ad, remarks that he made this year. “Who would have thought five years ago you didn’t know what the hell it was?”
The ad then cuts to Fox News host Judge Jeanine Pirro saying back in 2012, “Donald Trump made a controversial decision to allow a transgendered woman, born as a man, to compete in the Miss Universe beauty pageant.”
“I said, ‘let her run, and I think I made the right decision, I feel fine with the decision,'” Trump said during an interview at the time.
The ad then cuts to Talaackova talking about the medical process that he went through to transition, saying that it was “pretty intense.”
“It was obvious to us that she was entitled to compete,” Trump said during the interview at the time.
When a contestant was asked if it would be “fair” for a transgender individual to beat out a woman in the contest, the contestant, Olivia Culpo, said that she did support it.
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“I do think that that would be fair, but I can understand that people would be a little apprehensive to take that road because there is a tradition of natural-born women, but today where there are so many surgeries and so many people out there who have a need to change for a happier life, I do accept that because I believe it’s a free country,” she said.
Trump responded to Culpo’s answer by saying: “She gave a great answer and she really did a great job.”
When asked if “in the future can transgender women compete in Miss Universe,” Trump responded, “Yes,” according to a clip in the video.
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