Amid Oklahoma’s tight gubernatorial contest, Republican Charles McCall is hoping to stand out with a new political ad targeting gender-affirming care for minors. A 30-second TV spot entitled “Protecting Women and Children” opens with the 56-year-old conservative chopping a banana in half while spouting transphobic sentiments. “Let me be perfectly clear: Cutting this banana does not make it an orange,” McCall says to the camera with a smirk.
Standing against the backdrop of a white kitchen, McCall proceeds to acquaint the viewer with his anti-trans bona fides. During his tenure as Oklahoma House Speaker, lawmakers in the Sooner State have voted to limit trans sports participation and restrict necessary medical care for trans youth. In June 2024, the state also enacted a law defining biological sex as binary and assigned at birth.
“Gender is god-given, and there’s only two of them,” McCall says. “That’s why we outlawed sex change surgeries for minors and banned boys from girls’ sports.”
The commercial is intended to target McCall’s closest GOP competition in the governor’s race, Attorney General Gentner Drummond, as insufficiently anti-trans. In May 2023, Drummond delayed enforcement of the state’s trans medical care ban amid a federal lawsuit, a decision that proved controversial among supporters of the measure. At the time, Drummond claimed in a statement that the decision was intended to give the state “more time to mount the strongest possible defense” of its law and said the pause “should in no way be interpreted as a concession of any kind.”
With scarcely little daylight between their polling numbers, McCall has opted to pound Drummond from the anti-LGBTQ+ right. Ahead of the June 2026 primary, a September survey found that Drummond leads the race with 35% of prospective votes. McCall was right behind with 32%. In a press release, McCall’s campaign concluded that the results were a sign that his message is “breaking through and conservative voters are rallying to his candidacy.”
With an implicit finger pointed at Drummond, McCall concludes his ad by returning to the cutting board. “I’m Charles McCall, and I have a simple message for any lunatic pushing sex change for kids: You first,” he says, slicing yet another banana.
LGBTQ+ advocates strongly condemned the commercial following its September 26 release. Hailey Briggs, executive director of Oklahomans for Equality, calls the message “dangerous and unacceptable,” adding that “dehumanizing children to score political points puts lives at risk and fuels hostility toward already vulnerable communities.”
“Oklahomans for Equality condemns this rhetoric in the strongest possible terms,” she tells Queer Agenda in a statement. “Our youth deserve dignity, respect, and access to the full spectrum of affirming care and support, not to be vilified for political gain.”
The advertisement’s airing is particularly notable following the February 2024 passing of 17-year-old Nex Benedict, a trans student of Choctaw descent who died one day after being assaulted by three girls in an Owasso High School bathroom. Although an autopsy alleged that Benedict took his own life following the violent altercation, his family disputes the claim and has pursued their own investigation.
McCall drew significant criticism over Oklahoma lawmakers’ handling of the attack. A letter addressed, in part, to McCall on behalf of more than 350 advocacy groups called for the removal of anti-LGBTQ+ extremist Ryan Walters, the state superintendent of public instruction, for allegedly “fostering a culture of violence and hate” in Oklahoma schools. McCall, however, refused numerous requests to investigate Walters, despite claims that the divisive official had incited bomb threats against Oklahoma schools over LGBTQ+ inclusion. (Walters recently resigned from his post voluntarily to work for an anti-union organization.)
While declining to press for Walters’ removal, McCall reportedly posed for a photo-op with far-right state Sen. Tom Woods (R). In the aftermath of Benedict’s death, Woods made national headlines for referring to the queer community as “filth.”
Especially given McCall’s anti-LGBTQ+ history, Free Mom Hugs Founder Sara Cunningham tells Queer Agenda that she is “deeply disturbed” by his recent campaign ad. “Our trans youth are fighting to stay alive, and this is what Charles McCall brings to the table,” she says in a statement. Cunningham, who is based in Oklahoma City, adds that the advertisement is “cruel” and “beneath the dignity of Oklahoma.”
The banana-themed ad isn’t McCall’s first swipe at the LGBTQ+ community in the 2026 governor’s race. On September 14, he released a commercial bragging about his role in passing Oklahoma’s trans sports ban. After opining that “boys competing in girls’ sports is just wrong,” an unseen narrator credits McCall for “putting a stop to it in Oklahoma.”
“Others talk a good game,” the ad concludes. “McCall delivered.”
The assertion that McCall is uniquely responsible for Oklahoma’s regulations on trans athletics neglects a few key details, though. Its state legislature is among the most heavily conservative in the U.S., with Republicans controlling 121 out of 149 total seats, and those supermajorities make a trans sports ban nigh inevitable in the current political climate. Furthermore, 28 other states have also passed their own restrictions on sports participation, making Oklahoma’s law hardly unique.
It also remains to be seen whether doubling down on anti-trans rhetoric will prove a winning strategy for McCall. In May, Omaha’s first female mayor, Jean Stothert, fell short in her reelection bid after airing a series of ads alleging that her opponent, Democrat John Ewing, intends to “transition minors without their parents’ consent” and is “backed by radicals who will allow men in girls’ sports and bathrooms.”
But what is certain, as Freedom Oklahoma’s Mauree Turner tells Queer Agenda, is that McCall shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near a kitchen.
“While McCall seems to be attempting to garner attention through his ad campaign antics, he’s only let everyone know that he’s got a strange approach to eating bananas, can’t correctly choose a knife, and is still willing to put inflammatory politics in front of the well being of Oklahoma kids,” says the LGBTQ+ group’s director of communications in a statement. “McCall’s brand of backseat leadership is dangerous and has allowed some of the most nefarious actors in our state unchecked power to enact harm. Also, someone tell him most of us just eat bananas with our hands and mouths.”
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