THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

The NCTE received 27,715 responses to its anonymous, online survey, described as "the largest examining the experiences of transgender people in the United States."

"We wanted comparability with the general public," NCTE Executive Director Mara Keisling told Windy City Times adding that the questions used by the USTS were often culled from surveys given to the general population in order to achieve that purpose.

According to Keisling, the reasons for the dramatic increase in responses the NCTE received in comparison with the 2008/9 survey were numerous.

"The community has really grown and is networked better than it used to be," she said. "In '08 and '09, social media was a very different animal. This time we were able to use social media more effectively. There was also a substantially higher portion of our sample who identified as non-binary. It has become a more open and growing part of our community."

"Much has changed since the NTDS was conducted in 2008—09 and results were published in 2011, including increased visibility of transgender people in the media and in society in general," The USTS noted. "Despite making significant strides, there is still a substantial amount of work to be done to address critical needs in transgender communities throughout the United States. Transgender people continue to experience discrimination and anti-transgender bias in virtually all areas of life.

Over the next over 290-pages, the report's dispassionate catalogue of that discrimination and bias was described by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force as "devastating and unfortunately not surprising."

Among the results, 39 percent of respondents reported "serious psychological distress." Forty percent attempted suicide "in their lifetime, nearly nine times the rate in the U.S. population."

Seven percent had attempted suicide in the past year.

Transgender people living with HIV do so at a rate higher than five times the U.S. population.

Those who sought health care recounted a litany of problems.

Despite the anti-discrimination mandates that are a part of the Affordable Care Act ( ACA ), 25 percent of respondents reported issues with health insurance coverage "such as being denied coverage for care related to gender transition or being denied coverage for routine care because they were transgender.'

Although countless arguments have been made by international medical leaders that such procedures not only dramatically improve quality-of-life but are an absolute necessity, more than half of respondents were denied coverage for transgender-related surgery in the past year while 25 percent were denied coverage for hormones.

2016 has been a year with the highest murder rate of transgender people, particularly transgender individuals of color, ever recorded in the United States.

The physical and mental violence experienced by transgender people as noted in the USTS foreshadows that horrific milestone with reports of "high levels of mistreatment, harassment, and violence in every aspect of life."

Twenty-four percent of K-12 students reported being physically attacked at school. Forty seven percent were "sexually assaulted at some point in their lifetimes."

At work, 30 percent reported "being fired, denied a promotion or experiencing some other form of mistreatment.

The poverty level of 29 percent, homelessness responses of 30 percent, and unemployment rate which is three times higher than that of the U.S. population has led to higher "rates of experience in the underground economy including sex work, drug sales and other work that is currently criminalized."

The USTS stated that "nearly nine out of ten ( 86 percent ) reporting being harassed, attacked, sexually assaulted, or mistreated in some other way by police."

"Of those who were arrested in the past year," the report continued, "nearly one-quarter ( 22 percent ) believed they were arrested because they were transgender. In the past year, of those who interacted with law enforcement officers who thought or knew they were transgender, one-third ( 33 percent ) of Black transgender women and 30 percent of multiracial women said that an officer assumed they were sex workers."

All this as one of the most anti-LGBTQ administrations in recent memory prepares to take office alongside a firm grip on both houses of Congress and a possible homophobic and transphobic majority in the United States Supreme Court.

"I don't want to paint the Trump administration as being rosy for trans people by any means," Keisling said. "We're definitely going into uncertain waters, if not dangerous waters. He's appointed an [Environmental Protection Agency] administrator who is anti-trans. We've never had to worry about that at the EPA before. It's going to be a challenge. That being said, the survey is a tool we can use with any administration. In think we all know that there will be backsliding but we're not going to cede one inch."

Ironically, the fuel for her determination seems to be derived from raw numbers.

"The one number that folks need to keep in mind is that, when the Obama administration started, less than eight percent of the American public said they knew a trans person," she noted. "That number now is over a third of all people. As we increase visibility and acceptance of trans people we are going to be able to fight even our harshest critics. While they are coming at us with Religious Freedom Restoration Acts, we know that we are righteous, that we are going to advance forward."

"We're going to have learning to do over the next few years," Keisling added. "This survey is an important tool for that. Virtually every appointment that Trump has made so far are anti-LGBT extremists so we will have to see what all that means for us. But this survey will help us continue the work that is so important to educate, not just policy makers but the general public."

For the complete USTS survey report, visit: www.transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/USTS-Full-Report-FINAL.PDF .