Today, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) unveiled a $26 million plan for the 2018 elections. Their new offensive will almost double their current political staff and will focus on the key swing states of Arizona, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Nevada.

HRC’s goal, according to The Washington Post, is to “[r]eplicate what happened in North Carolina in Senate, House and governor’s races across the nation next year and make the LGBT vote one of the most forceful voting blocs in the progressive movement.”

Replicating the Democrats’ playbook in North Carolina will be an extremely effective tactic for HRC, but only if Republicans continue to replicate the weak, defensive “truce strategy” that has failed them over and over again.

What made HRC’s fight in North Carolina so effective was that they transformed a social issue — “gender identity” and bathrooms — into an economic issue. It started with the NBA pulling the All-Star game: JOBS LOST. The NCAA followed by pulling future college tournaments: MORE JOBS LOST. Then Bruce Springsteen pulled his concert: JOBS AND SOUL LOST. By the end, the media was reporting that HB2 — the state’s law regulating public facility use — cost North Carolina more than $3 billion.

The Left did such a good job at branding HB2 as a job-killer that voters opposed HB2 even while they simultaneously supported what the bill actually did.

Despite all of this, former GOP Gov. Pat McCrory only lost by 10,000 votes — out of more than 4 million cast. The real story is that the Democrats’ attacks against McCrory dried up his financial support. Despite being the incumbent, McCrory was outspent by Democrat Roy Cooper $21 million to $13 million. Think about that. The Democrats needed an $8 million advantage against an incumbent Republican to win by less than two tenths of a percent.

So now that we know HRC is planning economic terror against any state that fights this transgender insanity, how is the Right preparing?

With the exception of the pro-life movement, social conservatives are largely absent from politics. They have instead retreated to fighting the LGBT movement in “the culture,” whatever that means. Taking over Hollywood? Reforming academia? Posting some neat things on social media? Good luck with that.

At this point, social conservatives have two options. They can continue to fight the LGBT movement where the Left is strongest — in “the culture” — or they can fight the Left where the playing field is more even — at the ballot box, with the support of the American People.

Americans, by and large, don’t support transgender insanity, let alone understand it. They don’t want their kids learning about homosexuality or transgenderism in school. They don’t want their kids sharing showers with members of the opposite sex. And they don’t think people should be forced to participate in same-sex weddings against their religious beliefs.

But that will soon change if conservatives retreat and allow the LGBT lobby to make dissent from their radical agenda illegal. Think this is far-fetched? It’s happening right now through deceitful Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) legislation.

Conservatives need a political response to HRC. $26 million is a lot of money and will do a lot of damage — if left unanswered. And let’s be clear: even economic conservatives ought to be concerned, since the conservative movement as a whole is likely to suffer should the Left have its way in this fight.

So, will conservatives step up to the challenge?

And, if not, will the last one please turn out the lights?

Photo credit: mathiaswasik via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0