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Southern Poverty Law Center: 2023 CAPTAIN report

by Andrea James Reviewed September 2, 2026 7 min read

In 2023, Southern Poverty Law Center released a report titled “Combating Anti-LGBTQ+ Pseudoscience Through Accessible Informative Narratives” (CAPTAIN). It traces the origins of 21st-century anti-transgender extremism.

CAPTAIN argues that the anti-LGBTQ+ pseudoscience movement is not a spontaneous grassroots movement. It describes it as a coordinated, well-funded network spanning research, messaging, and legal advocacy. CAPTAIN describes how the movement recycles decades-old pseudoscientific tactics previously used against racial minorities and disabled people. CAPTAIN concludes that the goal is to roll back transgender rights, with Project 2025 identified as the movement’s current legislative endpoint.

Chapter 1: Introduction and background

Chapter 1 outlines the history of pseudoscience as a recurring tool of subjugation, tracing a lineage from phrenology and eugenics, through the pathologizing of homosexuality, to modern anti-trans claims. It introduces “rapid-onset gender dysphoria” (ROGD) as the modern movement’s central pseudoscientific concept.

Chapter 2: Foundations

Chapter 2 describes how an “old guard” of clinicians (including Bailey, Blanchard, Bradley, Cantor, Laidlaw, Levine, McHugh, and Zucker) lost professional standing after WPATH and the DSM-5 moved toward affirming models of care for young people. These clinicians then converged with a “new guard” of parents who did not accept their children’s identities as trans. Between 2015 and 2016 the “new guard” created three key blogs:

These blogs recruited a snowball sample of subjects for Lisa Littman’s controversial 2018 “ROGD” study (extensively corrected in 2019).

Chapter 3: Merging pseudoscience and politics

Chapter 3 documents a deliberate “divide and conquer” strategy to isolate transgender people from the broader LGBTQ+ coalition using pseudoscience, “parental rights” framing, LGB separatist groups like Gays Against Groomers, and sex segregationist “feminist” groups like WoLF. This fed into state-level campaigns and federal proposals, including Project 2025.

Chapter 4: Manufacturing doubt

Chapter 4 includes a citation-network analysis of 22 expert declarations by 16 authors across four major gender-affirming-care lawsuits between 2021 and 2023. Appendix 4.1 lists the declarations:

The analysis revealed the declarations rely heavily on a small, overlapping set of sources. Appendix 4.3 ranked the 114 top analyzed publications by frequency. It also found extensive text overlap between expert witnesses and internal documents of anti-trans group American College of Pediatricians. The authors note that courts have generally credited “moderate”-seeming witnesses (like Levine) while rejecting more overtly ideological ones (like Cantor, Hruz, and Lappert).

Chapter 5: Network dynamics

Chapter 5 maps 57 organizations into three functional types:

  • Research & Practice: produces the scientific-sounding content
  • Narrative Manipulation: translates it into anti-trans messaging
  • Legal Advocacy/Think Tanks: converts it into litigation and legislation

See Profiled organizations below. The report includes a case study in Virginia. The report traces substantial funding from conservative foundations and donor-advised funds. See Profiled funders below.

Chapter 6: Policing sex, sexuality and gender

Chapter 6 outlines government enforcement mechanisms, including:

  • Subpoenaing medical records of trans people
  • Forcing teachers to out trans students
  • “Sex verification” of suspected trans athletes, including genital inspections and hormone or DNA testing
  • Digital surveillance via subpoenas (geolocation data, online communication, app use, search history)
  • Restricting free travel
  • Age restrictions for LGBTQ+ content and events
  • Criminalization of trans people as “pornographic” or terrorist
  • Criminalization of supporters who “facilitate” trans healthcare or make trans-supportive content available
  • Rescinding nondiscrimination regulations
  • Enacting a “biological binary” definition of “sex” in law and policy, based on the gametic definition of “sex”

It also outlines private civil and legal enforcement mechanisms:

  • Bringing medical malpractice lawsuits (especially involving ex-trans plaintiffs) against providers and hospitals offering trans healthcare
  • Using “religious freedom” claims by anti-trans providers and parents to challenge nondiscrimination laws and conversion-therapy bans
  • Bringing lawsuits against school boards over trans-inclusive policies
  • Using the threat of litigation to discourage providers from offering care

It closes with recommendations, including expanding access to affirming care, strengthening inclusive/anti-racist education, and improving digital and scientific-literacy safeguards (such as conflict-of-interest disclosures in journals).

Timeline

The timeline outlines key events in the development of the contemporary anti-LGBTQ+ pseudoscience network from 2015 to 2023.

Profiled organizations

The report analyzed the following entities:

Research & Practice (16)

Narrative Manipulation (26)

Legal Advocacy & Think Tank (15)

Profiled funders

Chapter 5 names the following entities as major funders of the network and lists the organizations they have funded.

Foundations and other funders

Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)

Americans for Prosperity (Koch network)

Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation and Bradley Impact Fund

Charles Koch Foundation and Charles Koch Institute

Edward Charles Foundation

Dick and Betsy DeVos Family Foundation

Gregor G. Peterson Prize in Venture Philanthropy

Heritage Foundation

Sarah Scaife Foundation

Walton Family Foundation

Donor-advised funds

Some funders prefer using donor-advised funds, which allow them to contribute anonymously to controversial causes, among other benefits.

DonorsTrust

Edward Charles Foundation

Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund

National Christian Foundation

  • Edward Charles Foundation (previously)

National Philanthropic Trust

Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program

CAPTAIN authors and contributors

  • R.G. Cravens (editor)
  • Quinnehtukqut McLamore
  • Lee Leveille
  • Emerson Hodges
  • Sophie Wunderlich
  • Lydia Bates

References

Staff report (December 15 2023). Southern Poverty Law Center Releases Major Report on LGBTQ Pseudoscience. OutSFL https://outsfl.com/national/southern-poverty-law-center-releases-major-report-on-lgbtq-pseudoscience

Staff report (December 14, 2023). Pseudoscience network behind junk science attack on queer folks. Los Angeles Blade https://www.losangelesblade.com/2023/12/14/pseudoscience-network-behind-junk-science-attack-on-queer-folks/

Wiggins, Christopher (December 13, 2023). 60+ Groups Are Spreading Anti-LGBTQ+ Pseudoscience Across the Country: Report. The Advocate https://www.advocate.com/news/pseudoscience-transgender-splc-report

Nowell, Evan (December 12, 2023). SPLC Report Exposes Network Behind Junk Science and Disinformation Campaign Against the LGBTQ+ Community. Southern Poverty Law Center https://www.splcenter.org/presscenter/splc-report-exposes-network-behind-junk-science-and-disinformation-campaign-against/

Anti-trans coverage

Editorial Board (December 27, 2023). The Southern Poverty Law Center’s New Enemy: Americans Who Accept Biology. Quillette https://quillette.com/2023/12/27/the-splcs-new-enemy/

Mittermaier, Sarah [as “Eliza Mondegreen”] (December 17, 2023). Civil rights group condemns feminists as white supremacists. UnHerd https://unherd.com/newsroom/southern-poverty-law-center-condemns-feminists-as-white-supremacists/

O’Neil, Tyler (December 14, 2023). SPLC Demonizes Opposition to Transgender Orthodoxy as ‘Pseudoscience,’ Tool of ‘White Supremacy’ and ‘Theocracy.’ Daily Signal https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/12/14/splc-demonizes-opposition-transgender-orthodoxy-pseudoscience-tool-white-supremacy-theocracy/

Media

Southern Poverty Law Center with R.G. Cravens (December 12, 2023). SPLC Reports on Role of Pseudoscience in Anti-LGBTQ+ Efforts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43sp6Ekx-P4

Southern Poverty Law Center with R.G. Cravens (December 12, 2023). Key Findings From Report on Anti-LGBTQ+ Pseudoscience. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fmh-5PnLswU

Southern Poverty Law Center with R.G. Cravens (December 12, 2023). Recommendations From Report on Combating Anti-LGBTQ+ Pseudoscience. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqNH3P6Uo5I

Resources

Southern Poverty Law Center (splcenter.org)

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