Laverne Cox Mulls Fleeing the US as Trump Heads Back to the White House: 'I'm Scared'

Trans entertainer Laverne Cox opened up about being so frightened of a second Trump term that she – like other trans Americans she knows – is considering moving to another country. "We're doing research on different cities in Europe and in the Caribbean," Cox told Variety's Marc Malkin.

"I don't want to be in too much fear, but I'm scared," Cox said. "As a public figure, with all my privilege, I'm scared, and I'm particularly scared because I'm a public figure. I feel like I could be targeted."

Cox took note of the central role played in the Trump campaign of messages that demonized the trans community.

"I think they spent close to $100 million on anti-trans ads," the "Orange is the New Black" star pointed out. "It's deeply concerning."

Cox also addressed the threat to trans people's gender confirmation treatments. A number of states have already moved to ban medical treatment for transgender minors, and a more comprehensive ban could become the law of the land.

"I'm done with my medical transition, but I have to take estrogen for the rest of my life," Cox said, emphasizing that continuing the hormone treatments is a health issue. If medical professionals face criminalization for providing treatment to the transgender patients, such hormone treatments may no longer be possible.

Cox said she planned to "hoard a bunch of estrogen. It's a little trickier for trans men because testosterone is a controlled substance," the actor added. "But there are resources online."

The actor's fear wasn't entirely for herself; she tearfully described how the transgender daughter of friends was a high school student who was "stealth" about being trans, with her classmates not knowing. "I'm so scared for her," Cox said, sobbing. "I just want her to be safe. At this point, whatever you have to do to be safe and not be killed or terrorized so much as you want to kill yourself, stay alive."

With the architects of Project 2025 – the anti-LGBTQ+ right's 900+ page outline for a radical takeover of the government and reshaping of society – sharing deep ties with Trump, transgender stories could soon be criminalized as "pornography," and those daring to tell them labeled as sex offenders – a legal recommendation that's set forth in the document.

Such stories have already faced reluctance from cultural gatekeepers. Cox said she had already encountered resistance from entertainment executives when pitching trans-related stories.

"Over the past eight, eight or nine years, I've been actively pitching shows, a lot of them trans," Cox said. "Beautiful stories, too. I'm gagged over some of the shows that didn't get bought."

Cox went on to add: "There is brilliant talent, brilliant writers, brilliant storytellers who are trans, and so many trans stories that need to be told. But I have to be honest, I'm in a pivot place. I'm committed to trans storytelling because it's my passion. But again, I have to pay the rent."

Cox compared the United States to Germany's Weimar Republic – a period of broadening acceptance of LGBTQ+ people just before Nazis assumed power – and connected the dots between various hard-right attacks on longstanding American liberties that will affect the rights of heterosexual and cisgender people, as well.

"I believe in 26 states, there's a ban on gender affirming care for young people. In 25 or 26 states, they ban trans girls from sports," Cox noted. "There are also book bans that have happened in many states of queer authors as well as Black authors, Black queer authors, bans on AP African American history. It's all intersectional."

"Certainly I'm concerned about LGBTQ+ rights," Cox went on to say, "but I think it's not a coincidence that the attack on LGBTQ+ people, particularly trans people, is happening at the same time that there is an organized attack on reproductive rights. There are right wing people trying to repeal no fault divorce."