Elections

Andrew Giuliani Brings Up Baby Daughter in Gross Anti-Trans Remarks

HE SAID WHAT?!

The New York gubernatorial candidate made the off-color comments as he and fellow Republican Lee Zeldin attended a far-right rally.

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REUTERS

New York gubernatorial hopeful—and son of disgraced Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani—Andrew Giuliani brought up his young daughter in a weekend rant about gender, stating that he had “looked under the hood” and that she was a woman and “she’s gonna stay a woman.”

Giuliani’s comments, delivered at a Long Island rally by a far-right group, came amid remarks condemning options for transgender people. He spoke about his four-month-old daughter, saying he is “gonna be the last guy in a long time that looks under the hood right there.”

She “made a promise to me on the first day, right? My wife was sleeping, and I’m holding her [my daughter] in my arms. And I get emotional thinking about it, but she made a promise with me. She shook my hand and I said, ‘I’m the only boyfriend till you’re 25 years old, shake hands.’

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“Shook my hand. So I have changed the diapers. I have looked under the hood. She’s a woman. I’m gonna be the last guy in a long time that looks under the hood right there. But guess what? She was born a woman and she’s gonna stay a woman, it’s that simple.”

A spokesperson for Andrew Giuliani told The Daily Beast, “while Andrew does not claim to be a biologist, he can tell the difference between a male and a female.”

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Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and his son Andrew (right).

Spencer Platt

The rally, outside the Bellmore train station in Long Island, was advertised like a Woodstock for downstate New York’s fringe-right movement. The event, a rogue’s gallery of school board-storming groups, was hosted by an organization that the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated as an “extreme anti-government group.”

Rep. Lee Zeldin, the frontrunner in New York’s Republican gubernatorial primary, also attended the rally and praised that anti-government group, the Long Island Loud Majority, in his opening remarks.

“Big round of applause for our hosts: Long Island Loud Majority, always there fighting the good fight,” Zeldin said as the group’s flag flew to the side of the stage. It’s an eyebrow-raising alliance, especially in a blue state where Republican candidates usually try to court Democratic voters.

In Long Island, which Zeldin represents, the Long Island Loud Majority (LILM) is known for its participation in a series of chaotic school board meetings. In October, Newsday identified LILM as a leading instigator in a series of school board shouting matches about topics like masks and race. (The other group named in the Newsday report, Moms For Liberty, was also listed as an attendee at the Sunday rally.)

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Republican Lee Zeldin attended a rally for an organization labeled an “extremist anti-government group”.

Kevin Dietsch

Previously, the group’s co-founder boasted of bringing some 300 members to the Jan. 6 rally that preceded the riot, although none are accused of entering the building that day.

The group’s activities online and around the country have landed it a place on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s national list of extreme anti-government groups. The SPLC characterizes that anti-government movement as “part of the anti-democratic hard right movement. They believe the federal government is tyrannical and they traffic in conspiracy theories about an illegitimate government of leftist elites seeking a ‘New World Order.’”

The LILM made the list after the SPLC credited it with “hateful views espoused by members and anti-democratic activity,” Newsday reported. The LILM has disputed the characterization.

Reached for comment, Zeldin's campaign noted that LILM members were not accused of entering the Capitol. "Whether it's anti-semitism, attacks against the Asian-American community, or more, Congressman Zeldin denounces all hate and violence, including that witnessed on Jan 6th," a spokesperson told The Daily Beast, citing two of Zeldin's tweets opposing violence on Jan. 6.

The Long Island Loud Majority did not immediately return a request for comment. The campaign for Gov. Kathy Hochul, Zeldin’s presumed gubernatorial opponent, declined to comment.

Despite their anti-government credentials, groups like the LILM have found a home among the broader GOP, including among elected officials.

As a congressman, Zeldin has previously aligned himself with the GOP’s anti-democratic faction. On Jan. 6, Zeldin and two other New York Republicans voted not to certify President Joe Biden’s victory in two battleground states. He also voted against the creation of a committee to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. (Although this opposition was a majority opinion among House Republicans, it drew dissenting views even among the New York Republicans who had voted not to certify the 2020 election.)

The LILM was not the Sunday rally’s only far-right attendee. The event’s official lineup also included the People’s Coalition for New York (which recently hosted anti-mask rallies where unvaccinated people were compared to Black students during school segregation and Jews during the Holocaust), as well as Rudy Giuliani, who was there to endorse his son Andrew’s campaign.

Rudy Giuliani, who is facing a litany of legal battles related to his work to overturn the 2020 election, offered a short speech in which he claimed that threats of white supremacist violence are overblown. He said that Andrew (who has never held elected office) was a natural governor because “he was born knowing how to fight crime.”

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