Democrat Jonah Wheeler stood alone before a capacity crowd in the Peterborough Town Hall as critics, leaders in his own party, and even some childhood friends railed against the 22-year-old state representative’s vote for legislation deemed “transphobic” by progressive activists.
Wheeler (D-Peterborough) was unapologetic during Tuesday night’s question and answer session sponsored by the Peterborough League of Women Voters as he explained why he broke with his party and voted for HB 148. The bill protects the right of local institutions to keep biological males out of women’s locker rooms and bathrooms.
“Nobody should be discriminated against because of who they are,” Wheeler said. “We can respect trans women, and we can respect the rights of women who object to having trans women in their spaces.”
“You can do whatever you feel like, but your rights end when the rights of another begin. Government is about the balance of rights,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler explained that some biological women had approached him asking that he protect their spaces. “What was I supposed to do — ignore these women?” Several people in the crowd said, “Yes! Yes!”
“For some of you, the answer is ‘yes.’ For me, it’s ‘no.’ I’m not going to ignore these women,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler said he’s been getting angry calls, emails, text messages, and even death threats since he voted for the bill. The overflowing meeting room in the Peterborough Town Library was packed with people angry with Wheeler, as well as many supporters thankful for his heterodox vote.
New Hampshire Democrats have repeatedly and publicly accused Wheeler, who is Black, of supporting “Jim Crow” policies by supporting women’s-only spaces.
At one point, the League of Women Voters’ video stream of the event was hijacked, replaced with graphic images of sex, along with a racial slur. The stream had to be shut down.
HB 148 does not impose a blanket ban on transgender people, but allows local institutions and local sports authorities to set their own policies they deem appropriate. Wheeler refuses to consider the women who spoke to him in favor of the bill as somehow bigoted or transphobic.
“I voted the way I did because I did represent my constituents,” Wheeler said.
As attendees vented their anger at Wheeler, he maintained his composure throughout. When an attendee shouted, “How do you sleep?” Wheeler responded, “I sleep just fine, having done my research and having voted on the bill as it was written.”
Wheeler is one of two Democratic representatives to vote for HB 148, and both are from Peterborough. Rep. Peter Leishman was not at Tuesday night’s event, leaving Wheeler to face the angry throng alone.
Executive Councilor Karen Liot Hill, the lone Democrat on the council, stood up to condemn Wheeler’s vote, saying the bill is part of the “racist, misogynistic, and xenophobic” Project 2025 movement pushed by Republican President Donald Trump.
“I’m very sad to think New Hampshire is rolling back civil rights protections for Granite Staters,” Liot Hill said.
Executive Councilor Karen Liot Hill (D) denounces Rep. Jonah Wheeler (D) at an event at the Peterborough Town Library.
Dan Grosz, with the Peterborough Democratic Executive Committee, read a statement on behalf of the party condemning Wheeler and Leishman’s vote.
“We must express our deep concern and disapproval over your recent voting records,” Grosz
read. “While we respect your right to vote your conscience, our conscience compels us to publicly voice our opposition to your actions.”
Wheeler noted neither Grosz nor anyone else from the local party had reached out to speak to him about his vote before issuing the condemnation. Instead, Democrats turned out to call him a “fascist” and “useful idiot” at Tuesday’s event.
“The moral line of the party that’s been drawn by the Democratic Party is why this party has atrophied so much in the last 25 years,” Wheeler said.
The party in New Hampshire is dominated by affluent, White progressives who have little tolerance for differing views, Wheeler said.
“There’s so much fervor on the left that if you bring up one counter opinion from the orthodoxy, then you’re shouted down, screamed down. People don’t respond well to that,” Wheeler said.
Things got personal for Wheeler as childhood friends stood up to condemn him for his vote.
“You stabbed me in the back,” said Jane, a transgender woman who grew up with Wheeler.
Even Wheeler’s former grade school teacher, Mary Goldthwaite, tried to put him in a time out.
“I proudly voted for you, and I am ashamed of what you have done out in the world,” Goldthwaite said.
After the event, Wheeler told NHJournal the problem with the New Hampshire Democratic Party isn’t having representatives who vote their own way. It’s that the party leadership that is adrift and ineffective.
“The state party is failing,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler also decried the Democratic Party’s reliance on corporate donors.
“Look at the donors of the Democratic Party nationally. Look at the donors of the Democratic Party statewide. Why is Ray Buckley still our state chairman? We’re living with a corrupt party,” Wheeler said.
Jamie Reed, a former Missouri pediatric gender clinic case worker turned whistleblower who identifies herself as a “lifelong Democrat” was at Tuesday’s event. She said the way Wheeler was treated by the League of Women Voters and the moderator “shows they are not a nonpartisan organization. They had an agenda from the start.”
She also recounted a conversation she had with Dan Grosz, during which she pointed out that the vast majority of Granite Staters support Wheeler, not the extreme position his party is pushing.
“Are you familiar with events in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s?” Grosz responded.
Asked about his comparison to Nazi Germany, Grosz said, “The pattern of autocratic movements is to first pick on the weak and marginal parts of society and normalize discrimination against them first.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: This article has been updated to correct the spelling of Mr. Grosz’s name and add his responses.
