PRIDE in Protest
On Sunday, June 29, thousands took to Manhattan streets in New York City to celebrate the 2025 PRIDE parade. Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Eric Adams kicked off the march, and the crowds gave a rapturous welcome to incoming Democratic nominee for NYC mayor, Zohran Mamdani.
This theme in NYC this year, “Rise Up: Pride in Protest,” reflected a growing backlash against the Trump administration’s anti-DEI policies that have threatened LGBTQ+ communities across the country. Amid the colorful floats and rainbow flags displaying LGBTQ+ identities and rights, slogans promoting equality and acceptance, and calls for social justice and community, marchers held signs criticizing Trump’s rollbacks of LGBTQ-friendly policies.
Denying Trans Identities
On his first day in office in January, President Trump signed executive orders terminating D.E.I. programs across the federal government and recognizing only two sexes, male and female. The executive orders denying legal recognition of trans identities, followed by Supreme Court rulings upholding Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors, removed longstanding protections for transgender people.
Kevin Jennings of Lambda Legal, an advocacy organization that documents the potential negative impacts of certain policy initiatives on the LGBTQ+ community, told AP News, “We are in the darkest period right now since the height of the AIDS crisis,… I am deeply concerned that we’re going to see it all be taken away in the next four years.”
It was a sentiment echoed just a week earlier at a June 20th American Community Media (ACom) briefing, which brought together advocates—people of color from LGBTQ+ communities—to address what it means to be LGBTQ at this juncture. They discussed challenges faced by the LGBTQ+ community, particularly trans individuals, under the current political climate.
Unfriendly political climate
“The whole point is to dehumanize all of us,” said Helen Zia, a journalist and activist for Asian American and LGBTQ rights, and founder of the Vincent Chin Institute.
Aruna Rao, the mother of a queer and trans child and who founded Desi Rainbow, called the political, social, cultural environment for transgender people ‘truly, truly horrifying.’
She highlighted the stigmatization of trans identities and dangers faced by the trans community within the current political context. Each one of the series of executive orders that have been issued, said Rao, denies the very existence of transgender people, questions their legal identity, their social identity, and their cultural identity.
Her organization, Desi Rainbow, came into being as a resource for the South Asian community, “particularly parents and families of LGBTQ children who need education, who need support, who need to be led through that fear and bias that they first experience when their child comes out, to the side of understanding what their child needs from them, supporting their child, and not just being involved in their own family situation, but becoming an ally to the LGBTQ community at large.”
Today Desi Rainbow has evolved from a local support group that began at Rao’s kitchen table to a national and international community providing education, support, and chosen family for LGBTQ South Asians. “Our goal is to create a community that affirms all LGBTQI identities and creates a safer space for our communities.”
Dangers to LGBTQ+ communities
In the current political climate, said Rao, it was even more important to create allied intergenerational communities and safe, affirming spaces within immigrant societies for LGBTQ individuals.
“We are living at a time of great danger for the trans community, and this is a very unsafe environment for all trans children and adults,” said Rao. She pointed out that the executive orders could impact transgender individuals, who, for example, may be trying to obtain passports that reflect their true gender identity.
“For instance, my son, who’s a trans masculine person, would have to get a passport issued, saying that he was female. Now my son essentially has a beard, a mustache. He looks like a man, so imagine the fate of somebody like my son, who’s forced to have legal identification that does not acknowledge his identity. It compromises his safety. It increases gender dysphoria.”
Challenges for LGBTQ people
The broader implication of such decisions, said Rao, includes challenges for trans people in accessing healthcare and growing rates of depression, anxiety, and suicidality among LGBTQ people.
“It’s a fairly well-known fact that LGBTQ people have very high rates of depression and anxiety and of suicidality and suicide attempts,” said Rao, due to the stigma and discrimination they face in their environment.
Another consequence is the potential for trans soldiers to be dishonorably discharged from the military even after having served, she added.
A Supreme Court ruling
“One of the things I really want to acknowledge, is a moment of deep, deep grief for the trans community and for all allied families and people,” said Rao referring to the Supreme Court decision in the case in United States v. Skrmetti, which upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors.
“The case was bought by families from Tennessee who have teenage children who are currently in treatment, receiving gender affirming care, which is primarily puberty blockers and hormone treatment, which essentially provide a child the ability to live the way that they need to for their mental health and for their physical health,” explained Rao.
In a 6-3 decision, the Court upheld a Tennessee law that bans gender-affirming hormone therapy for transgender minors. The Court determined that the law does not violate the Fourteenth Amendment‘s Equal Protection Clause, specifically rejecting the argument that it discriminates based on sex.
Impact on communities
“This has huge, huge implications for the rest of the country,” added Rao. “Twenty-five states, I think, actually it might be increasing to 27 now, have already banned gender affirming care for minors. This is the decision that really should be made only between the parent, the child, and the medical provider, and now you have politicians and courts getting into the middle of this decision.”
According to Rao, transgender children are a tiny percentage of the population, and of that population, very few actually choose to have medical gender affirming care. “So, these children, essentially, their lives are in jeopardy. Their parents, if they want to support their kid, are now in a position where they have to leave their state, or perhaps not be able to get their child access to treatment.”
The impact of the court’s decision was to create ‘gender refugees,’ said Rao. Not all children and families have the resources to travel or the funds to travel out of state, “so we are looking at gender refugees, people who are moving from place to place,” trying to get their child the treatment that they need.
Impact on medical facilities
The court’s decisions also impacted medical facilities providing gender affirming treatment, added Rao. “There are many states that have instituted shield laws, which essentially allow gender affirming treatment to be available, regardless of what happens at the federal level.” However, “there is so much federal pressure on clinics and hospitals that are providing this care that many of them are choosing to close down preemptively,” she said.
The Children’s Hospital of LA, the oldest gender clinic in the country, closed its gender affirming care for minors because of pressure, federal pressure, and threats of funding cuts, making it even more challenging for people to access care, even if they have the resources.
“And this is just a situation for minors. These kinds of decisions will have an impact on care for adults as well, because insurance companies are now going to potentially make it more difficult for adults to access care. So this is a, this is a critical problem for the trans community at this point,” said Rao.
Impact on Immigrants
Immigrant communities also were suffering the brunt of the rulings, explained Helen Zia, an acclaimed Asian American and LGBTQ rights activist. Zia grew up as an Asian American in a time of significant discrimination and violence against LGBTQ people. She spoke about the intolerance faced by LGBTQ people of color, the invisibility of LGBTQ people within her community, and the societal expectations that led to fear and loss of basic rights.
“When I grew up, LGBTQ people were closeted. There were so many different forms of discrimination, hate and violence, and the expectation was that, if you did identify in any way as queer, that you could be arrested, you could be killed, you could lose your job. If you had children, you could lose your children, you could lose your families, you could lose your communities.”
So as a young woman in her 20s, Zia denied her queer identity to protect herself and her family from the stigma, a denial that was like “stepping into the closet and slamming the door shut,” remembers Zia. She voiced similar concerns about the Supreme Court decision for LGBTQ rights.
“Speaking of the Supreme Court, there’s no doubt in my mind that civil marriage for same sex couples could be reversed,” said Zia. Given that the court overturned Roe V Wade, a 50-year standing Supreme Court decision, she feared that the 2010 decision would put same sex marriage at risk.
“I think it is an incredibly dangerous, dangerous time,” warned Zia, for immigrant communities in the crosshairs of the administration.
“In our immigrant communities, we’re seeing queer people, transgender, being picked up to be deported, people who have sought asylum because in the countries they live in, they could be killed for who they are. And they have sought asylum here. They’re being rounded up and deported and put in prisons, terrible prisons, where if they survive that, they could then be shipped back to the country that they were seeking asylum from.”
The Importance of PRIDE
The panelists reiterated the importance of PRIDE in fostering visibility and community solidarity for marginalized groups under attack in a deeply polarized society.
“These are terrible, terrible consequences that are going on in our communities,” said Zia. “We cannot afford to be silent about any of the targeting going on.”
