The 2024 Chicago Pride Parade had no shortage of love, festivities and some protests despite its abbreviated route and entry cap this year.
The 53rd annual Pride Parade stepped off at 11 a.m. June 30 to roaring applause as the Boys Scouts of America led the procession south on Halsted Street.
This year’s parade took on a theme of “Pride is Power,” highlighting the Chicago Pride Parade’s role in creating visibility and change for LGBTQ+ people since its first march in 1970, which was held to commemorate the first anniversary of the Stonewall Riots.
For 13-year-old Roxanne Brock, who came to the Chicago Pride Parade from Indiana with his family, the parade was a chance to celebrate LGBTQ+ people front and center.
“I feel so seen here,” said Brock, who is transgender. “To be here right now with my step mom, my dad and a few of her friends, I feel so supported and loved. A lot of people don’t have that in their lives, so I feel lucky.”
This year’s Chicago Pride Parade saw a number of changes effectively downsizing the celebration as the city sought to lessen its strain on various Chicago departments during a busy summer packed with other large-scale events like the Democratic National Convention Aug. 19-22 and the Chicago Nascar Street Race July 6-7.
Changes this year included capping the number of entries allowed in the parade at 150 groups, which is down 25% from the 199 that participated last year; removing a few blocks from the start of the parade route; and shifting its start time to better align with Chicago Police shift changes, city officials have said.
Parade organizers have adjusted to the city’s new restrictions by prioritizing LGBTQ+ groups, businesses and employee resource groups. They’ve also consolidated participation among politicians, schools and other groups.
Many of those politicians kicked off the day with a pre-parade brunch hosted by Equality Illinois at Fat Cat, 4840 N. Broadway, where LGBTQ+ leaders celebrated their victories within the past year, including two bills that Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed into law that morning. See photo of the brunch below.
The first of the two new laws will require nonprofits that report grants of $1 million or more to other charitable organizations to disclose diversity information about their boards, Pritzker said. The other will make it easier for Illinois residents who were born in other states to update their birth certificates with proper names and gender markers.
“The progress we’ve made here in Illinois and around the country is thanks to all of you, who have continued to stand boldly alongside one another and demand equal opportunity and treatment under the law,” Pritzker said.
But that progress remains under threat, especially during an election year when LGBTQ+ rights are a topic of debate.
“Over 500 bills have been introduced across the country this year, attacking queer people, our safety, our dignity and our families,” said Brian Johnson, CEO of Equality Illinois. “What Illinois is showing is that now is the time, more than ever, for allies to step up, be bold and think big.”
But not every LGBTQ+-identifying politician chose to participate in this year’s Pride Parade. State Rep. Kelly Cassidy (14th District), went from the brunch at Fat Cat to the Rogers Park neighborhood within her district in protest of the Pride Parade’s downsizing.
Instead of marching, Cassidy planned on visiting a handful of Pride festivities in Rogers Park, including a celebration at Jarvis Square, where she was going to read books on the history of Pride to children and their families.
“I’m frustrated by the ongoing, decades-long efforts to ignore that this is really about celebrating our victory in a riot and what kicked off our generational change in our rights,” Cassidy said. “When this year’s parade plans started to crystalize and I was hearing members of the community weren’t part of the decision-making process, I was very disappointed.”
PrideChicago, which organizes the annual celebration, previously said the parade’s coordinators weren’t informed about the new restrictions until mid-March, leaving them with a few months to adjust plans. The city initially proposed an entry cap of 125 groups, but raised it to 150 after public outcry from groups including the mayor’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Council, which said it had not been consulted on the changes.
Mayor Brandon Johnson did not speak publicly before the parade stepped off, but marched alongside many of Chicago’s nine LGBTQ+ alderpeople, Cook County’s queer commissioners and other elected officials.
In addition to discussing the changes to this year’s celebration, parade-goers used Pride to raise awareness for a number of other issues affecting LGBTQ+ people.
Brock, the 13-year-old from Indiana, said he wants more people to understand the challenges that young transgender people face in schools.
“There’s been a lot of harsh harassment at schools toward trans people, and a lot of that gets ignored,” Brock said. “I feel like we should see that and try to help. I know there’s a lot going on and it can be hard, but it’s really important for queer youth.”
The Gay Liberation Network, founded in 1998 after the murder of Matthew Shepard in Colorado and three separate gay bashings in Chicago, took on a theme of “Feminists and LGBTQ+ People for a Free Palestine.” They were the final contingent in the parade’s lineup.
At least 200 people—more than the city’s cap of 100 participants per entry—followed the group’s float, playing music and reciting chants like “Hey hey, ho ho, the occupation’s got to go” and “Chicago to Palestine, stop the U.S. war machine.”
The group was calling for the U.S. to stop supplying arms to Israel and for Israel to stop its occupation and genocide in Palestine, said Andy Thayer, co-founder of the Gay Liberation Network. Protests over the issue have happened at Pride celebrations in other cities across the U.S., taking on the message of “No Pride in Genocide.”
“It’s important to elevate this message during Pride because there’s an ongoing genocide that’s happening in our names with our tax dollars right now in real time,” Thayer said. “But it’s also important because Israel defenders often try and use LGBTQ+ people as a defense for their oppression of all Palestinians. But if you’re in solidarity with LGBTQ+ people, you are against the fact that every single hospital and most schools in Gaza have been obliterated.”
Another group of pro-Palestinian protesters briefly stopped the parade at Broadway and Barry Avenue, holding a banner that read, “9 mintues for 9 months of genocide,” according to the Sun-Times.
Several spectators along the parade route waved Palestinian flags and signs stating messages like “Show love to LGBTQ Palestinians.”
This year’s parade was also a celebration of LGBTQ+ love, with three prominent couples serving as its grand marshals.
Comedian Fortune Fiemster and her wife, Jax Smith, served as celebrity grand marshals. The two met at Chicago Pride in 2015, just days after the Supreme Court’s historic ruling for nationwide marriage equality.
Feimster and Smith were followed by two pairs of hometown heroes known for their years of advocacy within Chicago’s LGBTQ+ community: Art Johnston and Jose Pepe Peña, owners of Sidetrack, and Myles and Precious Brady-Davis, a pioneering Black, transgender couple taking politics by storm.
Johnston, who co-founded the group now known as Equality Illinois, and Peña have participated in decades of LGBTQ+ activism in Chicago, including helping usher in a 1988 Chicago ordinance banning discrimination based on sexual orientation and the 1993 Cook County human rights ordinance.
Precious Brady-Davis made history in 2023 when she became the first Black, transgender woman appointed to public office in Cook County, when Pritzker selected her to fill a vacancy on the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. Myles Brady-Davis has been making moves in Springfield as communications director for Equality Illinois.
When speaking to Windy City Times, Precious Brady-Davis praised Johnston and Peña’s achievements, adding that she and her husband “stand on their shoulders when it comes to the work we’ve done in the community.”
Pat McCombs, a veteran lesbian activist in Chicago who participated in the Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame’s float, said this kind of intergenerational celebration of Pride is key to maintaining progress for the community.
“It’s good for the younger generation to realize those of us who came before and helped pave the way so they could feel more free today,” McCombs said. “But we’re learning from them too, like with pronouns and them raising awareness for how our community is evolving.”
Clemente Trejo said the parade was a display of the vast diversity within the LGBTQ+ community. Trejo attended the celebration wearing an extravagant headpiece inspired by an eagle, adorned with feathers from Mexico, he said.
“I’m feeling proud to represent my culture here,” Trejo said. “Pride is so important because it gives people more of an explanation on who we are, what we stand for and how to show respect for everyone.”
Regine, who danced on the Asians and Friends Chicago float in the parade, said the celebration was a display of unity.
“Even within our group, we have Asian people from all over—myself from the Philippines,” Regine said. “But you look around and you see people from all backgrounds and different experiences. But today, we are one.”
PHOTOS BELOW BY JOSEPH STEVENS (GALLERY #1)
PHOTOS BELOW BY RONIT BEZALEL (GALLERY #2)
PHOTOS BY JESS SAVAGE (GALLERY #3)
PHOTOS BY VERN HESTER (GALLERY #4)
Equality Illinois Brunch before the parade. Photos in this gallery by Joseph Stevens
More photos by Vern Hester
Photo by Kayleigh Padar
More photos by Vern Hester
