Marching bands, floats and revelers festooned in rainbows and sparkles are expected to fill the streets of Washington on Saturday for one of the world’s largest L.G.B.T.Q. festivals.
The city holds a local Pride parade annually. But this year’s event will be much bigger, as Washington hosts the WorldPride Parade, which attracts visitors from around the world. Sydney hosted it last time, and Amsterdam is up next.
This year’s location was decided before the 2024 election that brought Donald J. Trump back to the White House, which sits less than half a mile from where the parade’s route will culminate on Saturday.
The parade is not expected to attract as many people as organizers had hoped, with some international L.G.B.T.Q. groups deciding not to participate. Momentum for the event began to slow shortly after Mr. Trump’s inauguration.
Mr. Trump has issued executive orders restricting gender identities on travel documents and barring transgender people from serving in the military. He has also pushed the federal government to end its diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, and many private companies have followed his lead. He took over the Kennedy Center, demanding that the Washington-based arts venue stop hosting drag shows.
Just this week, Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, ordered the Navy to consider removing the name of Harvey Milk, the gay rights icon, from one of its ships, arguing that the name may not reflect the nation’s “warrior ethos.”
Some corporate sponsors of previous Pride parades pulled their funding this year or did not renew their financial support. Ryan Bos, the executive director of Capital Pride Alliance, said that corporate funding reached about only half of the fund-raising goal for WorldPride and that some sponsors who did offer funding asked that their logos not be prominently displayed.
Even amid this climate, the WorldPride parade, which begins at 2 p.m. on Saturday, is expected to be a joyful affair, according to its organizers. The day is scheduled to end with a performance on the Capitol Concert Stage by the actress and singer Cynthia Erivo.
The parade has named three grand marshals: the actress and trans activist Laverne Cox, the lesbian performer Reneé Rapp and Deacon Maccubbin, who helped organize the city’s first Pride parade 50 years ago outside his L.G.B.T.Q. bookstore, Lambda Rising.
Peaches Christ, a drag queen from San Francisco, has been at WorldPride this week to host a performance by the International Pride Orchestra (which was originally set for the Kennedy Center but moved to the Music Center at Strathmore in Maryland).
She said the energy at WorldPride has been “electric.”
“The vibe this year is that Pride is a protest,” she said. “The community is fired up and ready to fight.”
Heather Knight is a reporter in San Francisco, leading The Times’s coverage of the Bay Area and Northern California.
Campbell Robertson reports for The Times on Delaware, the District of Columbia, Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.
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