Tiger King’s Joe Exotic shares policies for 2024 presidential run – and it’s mostly petty transphobia
‘Tiger King’ star Joe Exotic was jailed for trying to have an animal rights activist murdered.
Jailed Tiger King star Joe Exotic has started his campaign to become president of the United States with an anti-trans rant, telling queer people to “be happy and shut the hell up” about LGBTQ+ rights.
Having announced his presidential candidacy last month, the star of the hit Netflix series has now taken his bid for the White House in 2024 to social media, promoting his “policies” and criticising president Joe Biden.
In one post he stated: “Just for the record, a woman has a vagina, a man has a penis, a man cannot get pregnant and I don’t care how many surgeries you have, you are still inside the sex you were born. That’s my policy.”
Exotic doubled down on his views in the caption for the Instagram post, saying: “I have a transgender writing my policy, and she agrees that no one under 18 should be thinking about changing. She also agrees she don’t [sic] belong in women’s sports.”
He elaborated on his views in the comments, saying he was “a gay man who fought through the 80s to just be accepted and get people to quit gay bashing”.
Exotic, who is currently serving a 21-year prison sentence after being found guilty of several crimes related to a murder-for-hire plot against wildlife activist Carol Baskin, in addition to numerous violations of the Endangered Species Act, intends to run as a Democrat.
The convicted felon added: “Today, the LGBTQ community shoves it down people’s throat and set us back 30 years. Live and let live and keep it your business not everyone else’s.”
He said it’s “Ok to be trans” but not for a child “[who] doesn’t even know who they are yet”, adding that business owners should not have to “bear the expense to put in separate bathrooms”.
In a post a day later, Joe Exotic alleged that the LGBTQ+ community was allowing the Biden administration to sponsor extortion and abuse in federal prisons instead of “raising hell… to protect their own”.
He repeated some of his earlier claims but also questioned why queer people can’t “just be happy with what we have”.
He went on to say: “I don’t understand what else they want. Free surgeries? Not on my watch, unless it’s life-saving.”
Replying, a number of people pointed to the rise of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in the US, particularly attempts to restrict healthcare for trans people.
One person, @charngles, said it was not a “shut-the-hell-up” scenario, highlighting situations where doctors have refused trans people healthcare.
Joe Exotic, whose real name is Joseph Allen Maldonado, appeared unaware of this, asking whether it was just because people could not get their insurance to pay for elective surgeries.
Another user, @scar_wolfcoon_, asked if Exotic was aware of laws Republican lawmakers were trying to pass. “This isn’t equality just because it’s changed slightly since the 70s,” they said.
