“If you’re a middle-class or upper-middle-class white parent and the only thing you care about is whether your kid goes to Harvard or Yale, obviously that path has become much more difficult for a lot of upper-middle-class people . kids,” Vance, a graduate of Yale Law School, told “The Joe Rogan Epxerience,” adding that the only way to get an edge in elite college admissions “is to be trans” or “gender nonbinary.”

Vance, the junior senator from Ohio, offered no evidence of that claim.

“Like much of what Vance says, there is no evidence that Vance’s claims are true,” Sarah Kate Ellis, president of the advocacy group GLAAD, said in a statement.

“Being transgender is actually a barrier for many students applying to colleges. More than 20 states have bans or restrictions on best health care practices for transgender youth, making it even more difficult to find a college in a state that respects trans lives and protects access to the health care they need.” she added. “These dangerous and absurd comments are more of the same damaging, completely fabricated rhetoric central to Vance himself and the misinformation he continues to spread.”