river/intercept
SMSurveyMonkey/Momentive
19th News/SurveyMonkey poll on gender-affirming care access · Sep 8–15, 2025 · US national
Methodology
- Pollster
- SurveyMonkey/Momentive commercial
- Sponsor
- The 19th News / SurveyMonkey
- Commissioned by
- The 19th
- Fielded
- Sep 8–15, 2025
- Population
- adults
- Sample size
- 20,807
- Sample frame
- river/intercept
- Panel
- SurveyMonkey Audience / SurveyMonkey platform river sample
- Mode
- online - SurveyMonkey river/intercept sample of U.S. adults
- Margin of error
- modeled error estimate of plus or minus 1.0 percentage points
- Weighting
- weighted for age, race, sex, education and geography to Census Bureau American Community Survey targets for U.S. adults 18+; transgender respondents additionally weighted by gender and party using KFF/Washington Post parameters
- Geography
- US national
Sources
Verification note. PARTIALLY VERIFIED. Percentages and field dates retrieved from SurveyMonkey's own Curiosity write-up. That page does not publish the literal question stems, the sample size, the mode statement or the error estimate, so those fields are null and the wording is a reconstruction from the reported response categories. Note the release_date is approximate (the page is dated September 2025 but no exact publication date was shown). TO CLOSE: obtain the SurveyMonkey topline/crosstab for this wave. || Percentages read from SurveyMonkey's own Curiosity write-up of the September 2025 wave; that page presents the items as summary labels rather than printing the questionnaire, so no wording is verbatim and no party crosstabs were published on the page. n and modeled error come from the same source family via search. Release date is approximate (month known). || Figures and methodology read from The Advocate's syndication of The 19th's write-up, retrieved in session (19thnews.org itself is behind a Cloudflare block for this client). NOT VERIFIED against a SurveyMonkey topline; question stems are the reporter's descriptions. MISSING: the exact favor/oppose split on the lawmaker-ban item, which the write-up characterises only as 'half of Americans oppose'. || Figures and methodology read from The Advocate's syndication of The 19th's write-up and from Erin In The Morning's reporting on the same crosstabs, both retrieved in session (19thnews.org itself is behind a Cloudflare block for this client). NOT VERIFIED against a SurveyMonkey topline; question stems are reporters' descriptions.
Figures below are transcribed from these documents. Where they disagree with the source, the source governs.
Questions asked (9)
whether politicians should focus on transgender issues at all - third fielding of the 19th/SurveyMonkey tracker
[Which should politicians focus on regarding transgender issues?] Politicians should not focus on transgender issues at all / Politicians should focus on protecting transgender individuals / Politicians should focus on restricting access to gender-affirming care
Wording reconstructed from: Reconstructed from SurveyMonkey's description of the response categories on the Curiosity page; literal stem not published
Politicians should not focus on transgender issues at all
40%
Politicians should focus on protecting transgender individuals
29%
Politicians should focus on restricting access to gender-affirming care
25%
Wording notes: the 'do not focus' option is a salience response competing against two directional policy options | the restrictive option is narrowed to gender-affirming care while the affirming option is broad
unclear — Literal stem unavailable; the two directional options are not parallel in scope, a structural asymmetry that likely inflates the affirming share relative to the restrictive one.
support for the right of transgender adults and minors to access gender-affirming care
[Do you favor the right of transgender adults to access gender-affirming care? / the right of transgender minors to access gender-affirming care?]
Wording reconstructed from: Paraphrase from SurveyMonkey's Curiosity write-up; literal stem not published
Favor the right to access gender-affirming care
53%
Favor the right to access gender-affirming care
37%
Wording notes: framed as a 'right to access' rather than as legality or funding, which tends to raise support relative to funding-framed items
unclear — Literal wording not available; the 'right to access' construction is more affirming than a ban/permit framing, which should be noted when comparing to AP-NORC or Pew ban items from the same period.
Subgroup figures (6)
right of transgender adults to access gender-affirming care
Right of transgender adults to access gender-affirming care
Wording reconstructed from: item label as printed in SurveyMonkey's Curiosity write-up; full stem not published there
Wording notes: framed as a 'right'
tilts_affirming — framing the object as a 'right' rather than as access or as a policy tends to raise support
Subgroup figures (6)
right of transgender minors to access gender-affirming care
Right of transgender minors to access gender-affirming care
Wording reconstructed from: item label as printed in SurveyMonkey's Curiosity write-up
Wording notes: framed as a 'right'
tilts_affirming — 'right' framing as above; still produces a minority result
what politicians should do about transgender issues
Should politicians focus on transgender issues?
Wording reconstructed from: paraphrase of the item as summarised on SurveyMonkey's Curiosity page
Politicians should not focus on transgender issues
40%
Focus on protecting transgender individuals
29%
Focus on restricting access to gender-affirming care
25%
Wording notes: the restrictive option is specified narrowly as 'restricting access to gender-affirming care' rather than restriction generally
unclear — the two directional options are not symmetric in scope (protect people vs restrict one policy), and the verbatim stem is unavailable
trans minors; umbrella 'gender-affirming care'; ACCESS framing; asked in the same instrument as the parallel adult item, which is the point
[Do you believe] transgender minors should have access to gender-affirming care
Wording reconstructed from: The 19th / SurveyMonkey write-up as syndicated by The Advocate, Sept. 25, 2025.
Trans minors should have access
37%
Wording notes: ACCESS framing (support = permit) | umbrella term with no treatment named | no age threshold beyond 'minors' | paired within the instrument with an identically worded adult item
neutral — The design value here is the minor/adult pair on identical wording: 53% for adults versus 37% for minors, a 16-point age-of-patient effect measured inside one instrument. The very large n (20,807) also supports the parent/non-parent contrast (31% vs 47%), which most polls cannot resolve.
Subgroup figures (2)
transgender adults; umbrella 'gender-affirming care'; ACCESS framing; the comparison case for the minors item
[Do you believe] transgender adults should have access to gender-affirming care
Wording reconstructed from: The 19th / SurveyMonkey write-up as syndicated by The Advocate, Sept. 25, 2025.
Trans adults should have access
53%
Wording notes: ACCESS framing | umbrella term | adult patients
neutral — Included as the within-instrument control for the age-of-patient effect on the youth item.
transgender minors; whether LAWMAKERS should ban or restrict gender-affirming care - actor is the legislature, and 'ban or restrict' bundles two different severities
[Do you favor or oppose] lawmakers banning or restricting gender-affirming care for transgender minors
Wording reconstructed from: Erin In The Morning's reading of the 19th News/SurveyMonkey crosstabs, Sept. 25, 2025; stem not published.
Wording notes: BAN framing (favor = restrict) | 'ban or restrict' is double-barreled - a respondent who would accept age limits but not a prohibition has no clean answer | the actor is named as lawmakers, which activates general distrust of legislative intervention | four-point scale with no midpoint, forcing a side
double_barreled — The contrast with this poll's own access item is the finding: only 37% say trans minors should have access, yet 52% oppose lawmakers banning or restricting that access. The same respondents decline to endorse the care and decline to endorse prohibiting it - which is the central, most replicated structure in youth-medical-care polling and the reason ban-framed and access-framed numbers cannot be read as complements.
Subgroup figures (8)
party
gender
race
lgbtq_status
whether politicians know enough about transgender care to write laws about it
[Do you agree that] politicians don't know enough about transgender care to be writing laws on it
Wording reconstructed from: Erin In The Morning's reading of the 19th News/SurveyMonkey crosstabs, Sept. 25, 2025.
Agree politicians don't know enough
64%
Wording notes: states a negative proposition and asks for assent | no treatment or age named | recorded here because it is the competence channel that ban-framed items pick up implicitly
tilts_affirming — An agree/disagree item phrased in the negative will collect acquiescence, and the proposition is one most respondents will find agreeable regardless of their policy view. Still useful: 64% agreement including a Republican majority helps explain why ban items lose support the moment the actor is named as a legislature rather than left implicit.