‘Teens can’t vote’: Elizabeth Warren tweet praising gender neutral licenses backfires

US presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren’s strategy to appeal to progressive voters by praising New Hampshire for passing a law to allow citizens to mark their gender as ‘X’ appears to have backfired massively.

Warren took to Twitter on Thursday to praise the state for passing a bill to allow non-binary drivers to mark ‘X,’ instead of ‘M’ or ‘F,’ as their gender on New Hampshire licenses. 

“This is an important step to ensure that non-binary Americans are seen and respected. Way to go, New Hampshire. All states should do the same,” she wrote. However, it appears her followers are not responding to the mooted nationwide gender-neutral scheme as hoped.  

The tweet drew more than 3,000 comments, the vast majority of which are negative and critical of the Massachusetts senator for “pandering to this regressive, conservative ideology.”

“This road leads to lost votes. The tide is turning on gender identity ideology…” wrote one commenter. “Too bad teens don’t vote,” was another wry reply. Others questioned how the change would affect law enforcement, and their ability to identify a suspect or victim. 

Polling on the Democratic primary race has consistently shown Warren trailing behind Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders in New Hampshire, according to polling site FiveThirtyEight. So it’s possible the candidate was attempting to gain some support by praising the state, or perhaps it was a not-so-well executed plan to appeal to liberal voters. Either way, she appears to have won few followers with the poorly received message.

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