Door by Door, Equality Michigan Is Building Support for Trans Rights Across the State
New deep canvassing initiative is meeting Michigan voters where they live
A new statewide canvassing initiative is aiming to combat the war on trans bodies with "empathy, connection and real conversation."
In November 2025, Equality Michigan launched the new Trans Organizing and Narrative Shift project, or TONS for short. In coordination with the Equality Federation, the LGBTQ+ advocacy organization is leading a revolutionary strategy to educate voters on the experiences of trans people in their community, right at their doors.
TONS starts similarly to other traditional canvassing efforts — door-to-door conversations intended to increase awareness of an issue at the discretion of a political campaign, nonprofit or other organization with community goals. This canvassing initiative, however, was born out of the increasingly volatile political environment targeting trans people, according to the program's organizers.
"We have had this really bizarre dystopian last decade or so of escalating anti-trans attacks globally, but especially in the United States," said Emme Zanotti, senior director of movement building & political Affairs at Equality Michigan, in an interview with Pride Source. "We see especially in these last eight years how this sort of anti-trans propaganda campaign has translated into a policy campaign."
In the 2025 legislative session, the ACLU tracked 616 anti-LGBTQ+ bills across the country, 21 of which resided in Michigan. In 2026 so far, the ACLU is tracking 519 anti-LGBTQ+ bills, 22 of which reside in Michigan.
"It's an all-out assault," Zanotti said. "Being a member of a community that's being targeted by fascism in that way is unsettling when you're sitting at a restaurant just trying to exist in public."
The canvassing initiative was also a product of a model that Equality Michigan used in previous cycles. In 2024, Republicans spent an estimated $215 million on broadcast ads targeting trans communities. That same year, Equality Michigan took part in the national storytelling campaign, Here We Are. The campaign included two trans Michiganders, Syd and Chrissy, and was built around a desire to “create connections between and among communities who otherwise may never meet.”
According to Zanotti, telling Syd's and Chrissy's stories inspired a more personal program.
"What if we could do this at a more micro level? What if we could do this voter by voter, constituent by constituent, neighbor by neighbor… getting above all of the noise, like Facebook and Fox News, and just meeting folks where they're at," Zanotti said.
The TONS project has been running for several months now, and the results speak for themselves.
"When rubber hit the road, everyone I talked to thought that everyone should have the ability to be themselves, have legal protections from discrimination, and be able to participate in society as equal members," said Emma, who asked that we publish only her first name. Emma is a canvasser for TONS and a member of the Huron Valley chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America.
In November and December of last year, Emma and 21 other canvassers knocked on 354 doors across Michigan. Conversations lasted up to an hour and a half, and canvassers reported significant improvements in what the community members believed trans people deserved.
"I think this offers a lot of hope in terms of being able to break down this information and share an actual human experience with people and grow acceptance and understanding," Zanotti said.
The main prerogative of these conversations was to bridge the gap in education, as voters become increasingly consumed by conservative political propaganda.
"Many folks didn't have an understanding of what it means to be trans and, in particular, weren't aware of the day-to-day struggles of being trans in the U.S.," Emma said. "In general, they were more likely to have heard conservative talking points like sports fairness and youth transition than about the discrimination we face in housing, employment and healthcare."
Those conservative talking points are sure to become increasingly common as Michigan prepares for an incredibly important midterm election. This cycle will decide the fate of all 13 U.S. representatives, a U.S. senator, the governor, the secretary of state, the attorney general, two state supreme court seats and every single member of the Michigan House of Representatives and the Michigan Senate. This is a year that will define the political atmosphere for anti-trans legislation.
"The hope then is that they eventually transform that empathy into action — engaging in the electoral process, taking direct action and participating in mutual aid on behalf of the transgender community," Emma said. "The act of showing up for a canvass can lead to more and bigger steps, and we need as many people as possible to join us in walking together toward a better future."
Equality Michigan plans to host more TONS canvassing days, and for Michiganders interested in participating but worried about potential risks, the project prepares canvassers with the tools and the company to do this work in a way that never compromises safety.
"For anyone who's door-knocked before, I wouldn't expect it to be like your typical canvass," Zanotti said. "All of our folks who are going to engage in deep canvassing from a volunteer level go through a full two-hour training first, and we make sure they're comfortable with every aspect of what we're doing."
Canvassers also never do this work alone; they travel in groups around neighborhoods and in pairs to knock on doors. TONS plans to run canvassing efforts across the state, with successful programs already run in Detroit, Lansing and Ann Arbor. The project will continue to focus on a community-level impact, which starts with conversation but ends in real progress, according to Zanotti.
"That's just how communities are supposed to exist. Neighbors are problem-solving together and having conversations with one another. So it's really sort of tapping into the most foundational aspects of being a human."
Visit mobilize.us/equalitymi to learn how to get involved with TONS and other Equality Michigan initiatives.
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