Donald Trump’s bid to steal the election hinges on a shameless homophobe who once called him a lying, idiotic bully

Trump attorney Jenna Ellis

It should come as no surprise that Trump’s desperate electoral coup attempt is led by a grossly anti-LGBT+ lawyer who calls same-sex relationships “abominable”.

“Evangelical advocate” Jenna Ellis, a senior legal adviser to the Trump 2020 campaign, has taken a central role in the president’s baseless allegations of widespread voter fraud after his loss to Joe Biden.

When Trump was first elected she labelled him a narcissistic “idiot,” a “bully” and someone who “really cannot be trusted to be consistent or accurate in anything”, but she changed her tune midway through his presidency and is now one of his closest allies.

One thing she’s remained firm on, though, is her outspoken anti-LGBT+ views.

“These sinners need our prayers also,” she once wrote on Facebook, “and while their conduct is vile and abominable, certainly we cannot forget that they are human beings, made in the image of God. Unlike gorillas.”

She showed little Christian compassion when she declared that HIV among gay and bisexual men is “God’s moral law and his supremacy”, nor when she complained that the Pulse nightclub shooting was being used to legitimise homosexuality and LGBT+ rights.

Jenna Ellis has also questioned the legality of the Supreme Court’s marriage equality ruling, insisted that “transgender ‘women’ are still men”, and dubbed the Stonewall Inn “a national monument to our open embrace and celebration of sin”.

And just in case you’re in any doubt, she’s also written a book which argues that “sexual expression will continue to pervade any sense of boundaries or morality, and the homosexual slogan ‘love is love’ will become the mantra of the paedophile”.

Given everything we know about Trump, it is unsurprising that he should spend the dying days of his presidency surrounded by virulent homophobes. But it serves as a stark reminder of what such people have to gain if he manages to steal the election.