Transender sex offend against cisender individuals

1. What the best population data show: trans people are victims, not a clearly over‑represented perpetrator group

National crime-victimization data found transgender people experienced roughly 86.2 victimizations per 1,000 people versus 21.7 per 1,000 for cisgender people in 2017–2018, indicating transgender people are over four times more likely to be victims of violent crime, a pattern inconsistent with a broad claim that trans people are primary sexual offenders of cisgender people ^{[1] [3]}. Health‑system and cohort research similarly reports extremely high lifetime rates of sexual assault among transgender and gender diverse people — “almost half” in some cohorts — reinforcing the picture of vulnerability rather than predation ^[2]. These high victimization rates are also concentrated among transgender people of color and incarcerated trans people, who report particularly high rates of sexual victimization ^{[2] [5]}.

2. What offender‑registry and prison figures actually say — and what they don’t

A national survey of nearly 1,000 people on U.S. sex‑offender registries provides a first look at LGBTQ people on registries but is limited by sample composition (average age 51; 87% White; LGBTQ respondents only 20% of sample) and by aggregation that can obscure subgroup differences, so it cannot be used to claim a generalized, population‑level disproportion of transgender perpetrators ^{[4] [6]}. In specific custodial populations, some datasets have been interpreted to show a notable share of incarcerated people who identify as transgender have sexual‑offense histories, but analysts warn that raw counts are easily misread: small denominators, different classification rules, and the concentration of convicted sexual offenders in certain institutions can create misleading ratios ^{[7] [8]}.

3. Youth and clinical studies: no consistent higher perpetration risk by trans youth

A multi‑site study comparing transgender, nonbinary and cisgender youth found transgender youth were more than twice as likely to report experiencing sexual violence but did not find statistically significant higher odds of sexual‑violence perpetration for transgender boys and girls compared with cisgender peers; aggressive behaviors and other risk correlates mattered, suggesting common risk factors across gender identities rather than a unique transgender predation profile ^[9].

4. Misinterpretation, political framing, and myths to watch for

Claims that link transgender identity to sexual offending often rely on selective snapshots — prison rosters, FOI snippets, or advocacy site compilations — that omit broader context, ignore victimization disparities, and can be weaponized to push policy changes ^{[7] [8] [10]}. Historic criminological work also cautions that equating sexual offending with sexual orientation or gender identity is a myth — for example, researchers have long rejected the idea that male sexual offenders against boys are simply “homosexual” in motive — underscoring the danger of simplistic identity-based attributions ^[11].

5. Bottom line, evidence gaps, and what journalists and policymakers should demand

The most rigorous available evidence frames transgender and gender-diverse people primarily as victims of sexual and violent crimes, not as a demonstrably over‑represented class of perpetrators against cisgender people; nevertheless, the research base is constrained by small subgroup samples, inconsistent classification, and limited national reporting on perpetration by gender identity, so definitive population‑level conclusions about relative perpetration rates remain elusive and require better data collection and transparent contextualization when using prison or registry statistics ^{[1] [4] [3] [7]}.