The “Transgender Defender” Machine in Mississippi
Updated: Oct 4
The anti-trans architecture built against Scott Colom — what’s verifiable, September 11, 2026
Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith used trans rights to block Scott Colom’s federal judgeship in 2023. Her re-election campaign now runs on the same attack. Colom, the district attorney challenging Hyde-Smith for U.S. Senate in Mississippi, faces a machine that predates his candidacy. Her campaign coined the “transgender defender” brand on day one of his run. The national party adopted it the week he won his primary. As of this week, a fake campaign website built to imitate his carries it. The infrastructure is ahead of the reach: almost none of it has traveled organically yet, and none of it is in paid rotation on Meta. This memo is the verified file.
2023 THE JUDICIAL BLOCK | JUNE 2025 FAKE DOMAIN REGISTERED | SEPT 10 FAKE SITE IN THE NEWS | 0 TRANS PAID ADS ON META |
Where the Attack Comes From
Colom is the elected district attorney for Mississippi’s 16th Circuit — a seventh-generation Mississippian, Columbus’s first Black prosecutor, elected in 2015 over a 30-year incumbent and re-elected twice. President Biden nominated him to the federal bench on October 14, 2022. Hyde-Smith blocked the nomination in 2023, saying: “As someone with a strong interest in protecting the rights of girls and women, I am concerned about Scott Colom’s opposition to legislation to protect female athletes” — and citing support he’d received from a George Soros-funded group. Colom had actually signed a 2021 letter of prosecutors opposing efforts “to criminalize transgender people and gender-affirming healthcare” — bills that would criminalize “parents who allow their trans children to receive medically recommended treatments.” The letter did not mention sports. Colom announced against her on September 3, 2025, and won the Democratic primary on March 10, 2026.
The Brand: Coined on Day One, Nationalized at the Primary
Day one — Hyde-Smith campaign manager Jake Monssen coined “the ‘transgender defender’” on the first day of Colom’s campaign, in September 2025 — responding to his launch stunt (a parody phone-call video the Mississippi GOP referred to the FBI as impersonation and his campaign defended as protected parody). The brand has been her campaign’s spine ever since.
The primary, March 2026 — the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s statement on his primary win: “Transgender Defender Scott Colom was handpicked by Chuck Schumer and George Soros to push their leftist agenda on Mississippi” — nearly verbatim the sentence it had issued on his launch day. The formula fuses the trans and Soros frames; she’d already used the Soros half in her 2023 blocking statement. By July, Hyde-Smith had adopted the label as her own — “It’s a correct accurate label, the defender of transgender” — citing, as her basis, the 2021 prosecutors’ letter.
The Soros carrier — an August 5 viral post put Colom on a list of candidates in “The Soros Empire’s $103 Million Hostile Takeover of America” (166K engagements) — the fusion frame traveling nationally without the trans half attached.
The Fake Website — Verified Today
On September 10 the Clarion-Ledger, the Jackson daily, reported that Hyde-Smith “labeled opponent Scott Colom as the ‘transgender defender’ in a website made to imitate his campaign site.” We located, captured, and archived the site on September 11. Four things check out:
A campaign-shaped domain — the site lives at colomforsenate.com — a campaign-shaped domain (his real site is scottcolom.com) — titled “Scott Colom | Biden’s Pick. Not Ours.” Its section names run the full fusion: “They/Their Agenda,” “Soft on Crime,” “Soros Funded.”
The claims, against the record — the “Transgender Defender” section claims Colom “pushed radical sex change surgeries [for] children” and “championed protections for doctors who perform these irreversible procedures on minors,” closing: “Whose children is Colom really protecting?” Its cited source is “Colom’s Legislative Record.” Colom is a district attorney; he has no legislative record. The underlying document is the 2021 prosecutors’ letter — which opposes criminalizing families and doctors, and says nothing about surgeries, sports, or any legislation he wrote.
Registered before he was a candidate — the domain was registered June 12, 2025 — nearly three months before Colom announced his candidacy (his real domain: March 26, 2025). The site’s record shows an update on September 3, 2026, the week before the Clarion-Ledger story. Someone built impersonation infrastructure for a candidacy that did not yet exist.
No visible disclaimer — no “paid for by” disclaimer appears anywhere in the site’s HTML text as captured September 11 — and the campaign claims the site openly: “Mississippians deserve to know who Scott Colom really is and who is behind his run for U.S. Senate,” Monssen said of it. Whether an attack site imitating a candidate can run without a disclaimer is a question for lawyers, not this memo; the capture preserves the evidence.
The Measured Picture
In our trans-discourse monitoring, Colom’s name has appeared in only about thirty posts all-time (~450K engagements), and the largest single item is a neutral race explainer (261K, March). The “transgender defender” phrase itself has traveled almost nowhere organically — local-press coverage of the fake site, about 4K engagements as of today. The paid picture matches. Colom’s own campaign is up on Meta with two positive spots since August 5 — ethics, then faith and public safety, roughly a million impressions each, no trans content. Neither Hyde-Smith’s campaign nor the national committees have a single trans-issue ad in Meta’s library for this race. One page — “Saw It Online: MS,” paid for by the opaque “Mississippi Speaks” — began running video statewide September 3, at 90–100K impressions. We could not review the videos themselves in this pass. To date, the attack is built — the label, the fusion frames, the fake site — and nobody has yet put money behind it. The moment someone does, the file above is the response.
A Few Experiments This File Makes Possible
What if sourcing were the rebuttal — when the “transgender defender” label surfaces anywhere — debate, ad, mailer — the file answers it: the label’s own website invents a “legislative record” for a prosecutor, was registered before he was even a candidate, and carries no disclaimer. The 2021 letter’s actual language — prosecutors declining to criminalize parents — defends families, not an ideology.
What if the record answered the block — her 2023 blocking statement cites “female athletes”; the letter he signed never mentions sports. Any reporter can check that gap in five minutes.
What if it were watched — Mississippi now sits in our weekly ad-library check (the fake site, the “Mississippi Speaks” advertiser, and any paid adoption of the label), and material developments will reach you in the weekly briefings the week they appear.
Source Links
Hyde-Smith statement on the Colom nomination (Apr 4, 2023): hydesmith.senate.gov/senator-hyde-smith-wont-blue-slip-coloms-judicial-nomination
The 2021 prosecutors’ letter (Fair and Just Prosecution; Colom is a signatory): fairandjustprosecution.org — FJP-Trans-Criminalization-Joint-Statement.pdf
Nomination coverage (Mississippi Today, Oct 17, 2022): mississippitoday.org/2022/10/17/scott-colom-federal-judge-appointment
Campaign launch and the day-one label (Magnolia Tribune, Sep 4, 2025): magnoliatribune.com/2025/09/04/colom-campaign-starts-race-with-fake-call-to-hyde-smith
NRSC launch-day and primary statements (Sep 4, 2025; Mar 10, 2026): nrsc.org — Scott Colom is Wrong for Mississippi · nrsc.org — Statement on the Mississippi Senate Primary
Hyde-Smith adopting the label (Magnolia Tribune, Jul 21, 2026): magnoliatribune.com — “…Senator Hyde-Smith doesn’t pull punches…”
The “Soros Empire” list post (X, Aug 5, 2026) and the March race explainer (X, Mar 9, 2026): x.com/TonySeruga/status/2085021474658927003 · x.com/burgessev/status/2031100735040147473
Fake-site coverage (Clarion-Ledger, Sep 10, 2026): clarionledger.com — “US Sen Cindy Hyde-Smith takes aim at Scott Colom in fake campaign site”
Campaign response to fake-site coverage (SuperTalk Mississippi, Sep 11, 2026): supertalk.fm — “Hyde-Smith launches fake website attacking Senate challenger Colom”
The sites (captured Sep 11, 2026; archives available on request): colomforsenate.com · scottcolom.com
Domain registration records (Verisign RDAP; dates as cited above): colomforsenate.com record · scottcolom.com record
Meta Ad Library (search “Scott Colom” and “Saw It Online: MS”): facebook.com/ads/library
Source: Trans Rhetoric Social Media Dashboard, Meta Ad Library (checked Sept 11), public records and cited press
