For many gay rights activists, President Trump’s first five months in office have provided ample evidence of his antipathy toward their community, whether it be his administration’s sustained attacks on transgender people, its bans on books with gay subject matter or its planned cuts to suicide hotlines for gay youth.
Members of Mr. Trump’s administration and his supporters have regularly trafficked in hateful rhetoric and employed stereotypes about members of the L.G.B.T.Q. community, suggesting a lack of honesty, morality and Marxist leanings, while officially ignoring Pride Month.
Yet, if you ask gay supporters of the president, you will hear a remarkably different message: of a man indifferent to sexuality who has hosted same-sex weddings and hoisted a rainbow flag; who has appointed a series of gay ambassadors and high-ranking gay officials; who has attracted a range of deep-pocketed gay backers and outspoken online surrogates. And, of course, who has been a steadfast Village People superfan.
Gay Trump supporters say that the economy and immigration are driving forces in their embrace of the president, mirroring shifts in traditional Democratic blocs like Latinos, Asian Americans and Black men, groups that have sometimes chafed at being considered monolithic in their political beliefs. But they also cite Mr. Trump’s “anti-woke” campaign, including his inflammatory and divisive condemnation of the transgender movement.
Those statements — including an oft-run campaign ad that accused Kamala Harris of being for “they/them,” while Mr. Trump was for “you” — have been applauded by some gay influencers, who say the concentration on transgender issues in their community has come at the expense of gay and lesbian concerns. Gay conservatives say that opinion is also quietly held by some of their gay liberal friends.
Shortly before the election, JD Vance predicted that the Republican ticket would win the “normal gay guy vote” because of the left’s embrace of the transgender movement. “They just wanted to be left the hell alone,” Mr. Vance told Joe Rogan.
Charles Moran, the former president of the Log Cabin Republicans, the leading group for gay conservatives, argued that Democrats and traditional gay rights groups had encouraged a sense of vulnerability in their community, despite significant wins in recent decades. He cited legalizing same-sex marriage and gays being able to openly serve in the military, advancements — it should be noted — that were backed by Democrats, and often opposed by Republicans.
“We’re continuing to achieve parity,” Mr. Moran said. “You don’t need all these groups that are based on victimization when you realize a lot of your people aren’t victims anymore.”
But such assertions are undercut by a range of discriminatory measures that Mr. Trump or the Republican Party have backed in recent years, according to major gay rights and civil liberties groups.
That includes a series of recent resolutions in Republican-led states seeking to overturn same-sex marriage, and efforts to do the same in the evangelical movement, long a bastion of conservative political support. Opponents of transgender rights also won a victory this month when the Supreme Court ruled that Tennessee could prohibit some medical treatments for transgender youths, shielding similar laws in other states. Such a state level approach closely mirrors the successful efforts of the anti-abortion movement, which capped a decades-long campaign to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022.
Mr. Moran and other gay supporters of Mr. Trump’s downplayed any effort to overturn the Obergefell decision, which legalized same-sex marriage a decade ago, and instead point to things like his embrace of — and by — Silicon Valley billionaires like Peter Thiel and Keith Rabois, both of whom are gay. They also trumpet the increased role and visibility of Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary, a gay man who is fifth in line to the presidency, and of Richard Grenell, the former ambassador and new president of the Kennedy Center in Washington, who is considering a run for governor of California.
Such advancements thrill supporters like John Sullivan, a Republican based in Nashville who married his husband, Dan Medora, at Mar-a-Lago last year. “President Trump appoints individuals based upon their merit and qualifications,” said Mr. Sullivan, who works in finance. “Not their sexual identity.”
Despite such testimonials, there is little hard evidence to support the idea of a broad shift to the right by the nation’s L.G.B.T.Q. voters. When asked his opinion, Kevin Jennings, the chief executive of Lambda Legal, which focuses on civil rights for the L.G.B.T.Q. community, had a two-word reaction.
“Hysterical laughter,” he said.
“Appointing one or two gays to prominent positions does not a gay-friendly president make,” Mr. Jennings continued, adding that “the policy agenda of the current Republican Party is deeply hostile” to gay rights.
“These gay MAGAs are a tiny minority within our community,” he said. “Let’s not overblow a few quislings.”
Coming Out as a Republican
The claimed surge in support from gay people for Mr. Trump has also not, seemingly, translated into a similar swell in the number of gay Republican candidates.
For example, the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, which supports “pro-equality” candidates from that community, says it is currently backing more than 160 contenders in elections across the country. The fund has had only one Republican apply for an endorsement this year, and that candidate did not qualify, though the group has endorsed Republicans in the past. And surveys have found that the percentage of L.G.B.T.Q. elected officials who identify as Republican is in the single digits.
Polling on the gay vote in presidential elections has been largely sporadic and unreliable, but a February poll from Pew Research found that roughly 80 percent of L.G.B.T.Q. adults were Democrats or leaned Democratic, while 16 percent were Republican or leaning Republican.
At the same time, acceptance of gay people, gay rights and same-sex marriage has risen over the last several decades, according to Gallup. In August 2024, the firm also found that 81 percent of respondents believed the Democratic Party best served the interests of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, versus just 11 percent who said the Republican Party did.
Still, Mr. Moran and others insist that things are changing and that Mr. Trump is the reason. “This is a very gay Republican Party,” Mr. Moran said, adding that Mr. Trump had led to a “gravitational change” in the party. “There are gays everywhere.”
Pete Holmberg, a vice president of the Manhattan G.O.P., echoed that, saying there were “a ton of secret gay conservatives” in the city. “A lot of the comments and likes and private messages I get are from gay men who appear to be fully liberal,” Mr. Holmberg said, adding, “There’s lots of curiosity” about conservative views.
Some gay supporters of the president describe experiences of “coming out” about their Republicanism, similar to their opening up about their sexuality.
Rob Smith, who has described himself as a “Black gay veteran Republican icon” with a sizable online following, said his decision to come out as a Trump supporter in 2018 cost him “friends, career opportunities, all of that other stuff.”
“It all kind of went away because that’s how deeply unpopular it was at the time,” he said.
Tim Miller, the host of “The Bulwark Podcast” and a political strategist who left the Republican Party because of Mr. Trump, said there was “a more prominent visible gay cadre” in G.O.P. circles now. But, Mr. Miller, who is gay, also thinks that some gay influencers and pundits are capitalizing on the relative rarity of being a gay conservative. “It helps these guys go viral in our media environment,” Mr. Miller said, adding that those influencers are often lauded by the G.O.P. establishment. “Republicans are attracted to people from groups that are discriminated against,” said Mr. Miller. “It gives them a happy feeling, like, ‘See? I’m not homophobic.’”
Jon Reinish, a Democratic political consultant who is gay, said Republicans were increasingly seeking to divide “normal gay guys” — as Mr. Vance put it — from “a demonstrably queer-presenting” people.
All of which, he said, is to convey the idea that sexuality is “an incidental, inconsequential element” of a person’s identity. “Even though it’s fundamental,” Mr. Reinish added.
To that point, in a recent podcast with the Politico reporter Dasha Burns, Mr. Grenell, a steadfast Trump ally, accused the left of intolerance and expressed dismay at Pride celebrations.
“It’s embarrassing, to be honest,” he said, adding that Pride parades were “real fringe” and “too sexual.” “I think we have to start critiquing ourselves,” he said. “And by the way, this is extremely popular with normal gays.”
‘Maybe they will be spared’
Mr. Trump rarely mentioned gay issues during the 2024 race, and he has remained largely mum since taking office, declining to even acknowledge Pride Month in June. Indeed, even as a global Pride celebration took place in Washington, Mr. Trump’s White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, derided “L.G.B.T.Q. graduate majors” while attacking Harvard University. Days later, word leaked that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was considering stripping the name of Harvey Milk — the famed gay leader, slain in San Francisco in 1978 — from a military vessel.
GLAAD, the nonprofit group that monitors discriminatory actions against gay people by political figures, has tracked more than 250 incidences — dating back to Mr. Trump’s first term — of the president’s actions or statements that the organization considers negative.
In his second term, Mr. Trump’s administration has canceled hundreds of millions of dollars worth of health research for L.G.B.T.Q. people; scrubbed mentions of gender identity from federal surveys, official websites and the Stonewall National Monument; and shown a close adherence to dozens of ideas in Project 2025, the lengthy conservative treatise that calls for ending “the bullying L.G.B.T.Q.+ agenda.”
Mr. Trump also initially froze funding for Pepfar, a successful global anti-AIDS program signed into law by President George W. Bush, before that funding was partly restored, though delays persist and funding for H.I.V. prevention remains blocked. More recently, the president’s persistent assaults on diversity, equity and inclusion programs have seemingly led corporate sponsors to back away from Pride events in liberal, gay-friendly enclaves like New York and San Francisco, leaving groups scrambling to find funding for their events.
Asked about the president’s performance among — and for — gay voters, the White House cited a series of appointments of gay officials, and two efforts started in 2019 to end the H.I.V. epidemic and decriminalize homosexuality internationally. It also noted efforts to bar transgender athletes from competing in women’s and girls’ sports.
“The overall MAGA movement is a big tent welcome for all,” said Harrison Fields, a White House spokesman, adding, “The president continues to foster a national pride that should be celebrated daily.”
But Brandon Wolf, the national press secretary for Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay rights organization, said the early days of Mr. Trump’s second term had been “what so many of us warned, which is an all-out assault” on the rights of gay people and other minority groups. “They’ve wholly sold themselves to the right-wing extremist agenda,” Mr. Wolf said.
He also warned that supporting Mr. Trump and his agenda could backfire for some gay people and the gay community as a whole. “I think there are people who see proximity to power and are willing to sell out to achieve it, and probably firmly believe that, if they are willing to sacrifice other members of the community, that maybe they will be spared,” Mr. Wolf said.
He added, “And that is a very dangerous approach.”
Mr. Jennings, of Lambda, echoed this, saying he feared that some fellow gay men would “prioritize economic self-interest over their civil rights,” adding that there’s “always groups of people who think that money can protect them.”
Still, Neil J. Young, the author of “Coming Out Republican: A History of the Gay Right” said gay supporters of the president — who he says are predominantly white men — “see Trump as the best Republican president the party has ever produced.”
“They see Trump as a president who has given them unprecedented access,” Mr. Young said, citing his financial policies and hiring of gay people. “They point to those sorts of things and they think, ‘We’re insiders now. We’re good.’ They take that as proof that he’s not going to turn on them.”
A Wedge in the L.G.B.T.Q. Movement
Some gay supporters of Mr. Trump’s say they are single-issue voters; but that issue, they say, is not one that has to do with their sexuality.
Bruce Langmaid, a retired real estate investor who lives in Palm Beach, Fla., with his husband, Charles Poole, and described himself as a “middle-of-the-road conservative,” said his main concern was immigration.
“I think the last administration was remiss in bringing all the people in, the illegals,” Mr. Langmaid said, adding that the country needed undocumented workers in the work force. “But the problem I have is when you bring one illegal in, they’re going to bring in 10 of their relatives.”
Others say the embrace of conservative politics is purely economic, even as Mr. Bessent has taken a leading, and sometimes uncomfortable, role in Mr. Trump’s tariff push.
George Santos, the disgraced former Republican congressman who — as a gay Latino Trump backer — was once hailed by some as a sign of the party’s inclusivity, joked that gay support for lower taxes made perfect sense, saying it would lead to more disposable income. “They do gay man math,” said Mr. Santos, who was recently sentenced to more than seven years in federal prison. “That’s one more Gucci, or whatever their poison is.”
He added, more seriously: “I don’t care that a commander in chief is pandering to my sexual orientation. I care that he’s making my life sustainable.”
Opposition to transgender issues has also galvanized online supporters like Arielle Scarcella, a lesbian who has spoken out repeatedly about what she sees as an irrational profusion of genders.
She said the Democrats — and the broader gay rights movement — had badly miscalculated on voicing support for “kids transitioning” and transgender women in women’s sports.
“Leave the women and kids alone,” she said, adding that if you mess “with the women and kids, your movement is going to die.”
Gay rights leaders say the attacks on transgender issues are meant as a way to drive a wedge inside the L.B.G.T.Q. movement — and inside the Democratic Party. And some well-known Democrats, including Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, have backed away from a defense of transgender athletes in recent months.
But Mr. Wolf, of the Human Rights Campaign, said he believed the second Trump administration saw “the acronym as one community,” noting that “at the very same time they are trying to strip trans people of fundamental rights and freedoms, they’re also defunding programs that are working to combat the H.I.V. epidemic.”
“This administration has always believed that the entire community is antithetical to their agenda,” he said. “And they have made that very clear.”
Susan Beachy and Alain Delaqueriere contributed research.
Jesse McKinley is a Times reporter covering politics, pop culture, lifestyle and the confluence of all three.
Guy Trebay is a reporter for the Style section of The Times, writing about the intersections of style, culture, art and fashion.
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