A few dozen LGBTQ+ people looking to process the results of this week’s election took their first steps toward action ahead of what could be a challenging four years for queer people.
Equality Illinois hosted a community gathering Thursday night at the Center on Halsted, 3656 N. Halsted St., for LGBTQ+ people and allies to connect with one another and unpack their feelings after former President Donald Trump’s election win. While attendees expressed despair and hopelessness regarding what could happen to LGBTQ+ rights, everyone left with a sense of solidarity and a list of action items they could take to protect the community.
“It’s important in the space that we’re making right now to feel our feelings, find that community and then also figure out how we channel that to take action to ensure the most vulnerable folks are protected,” said Mony Ruiz-Velasco, deputy director at Equality Illinois.
Fears for transgender and other LGBTQ+ rights
Chief among peoples’ concerns was what Trump’s win could mean for the transgender community.
Trump campaigned heavily on anti-trans attacks, spending more than $21 million on advertisements scapegoating the transgender community in efforts to rally his base. The advertisements, which aired during football and baseball games and in swing states across the country, claimed opponent Kamala Harris would let “biological men” compete in women’s sports and contained messages like “Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you.”
The former president’s campaign platform also promises to cut federal funding for schools that teach “radical gender ideology and other inappropriate racial, sexual or political content.”
“So I want you to think about what is at stake and who is most at stake at this moment, as the Trump campaign just served trans people up on a platter,” said Precious Brady-Davis, chief strategy officer at the Center on Halsted and a commissioner for the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District who just made history as the first Black trans woman elected in Cook County.
Ella Josefine Jasso, a surgical health educator at Howard Brown Health, said the organization has received an influx of transgender people looking to expedite their gender-affirming healthcare procedures in the days since Trump won. Ing Swenson, director of behavioral health at the Center on Halsted, said he has also seen an uptick in transgender people looking for letters of support needed to receive gender-affirming care.
“Trans people are telling me they don’t know what’s going to happen come January, so they’re seeking support now because they think there’s an expiration date coming up,” Jasso said.
Brady-Davis, who was a surrogate for Harris at the 2024 Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago, said the Democratic Party “did not have the proper response” to Republicans’ attacks on the community.
Despite multiple transgender people trailblazing by running for office this year—including Brady-Davis in Cook County and Sarah McBride, who just became the first openly trans person elected to Congress—the DNC did not feature any transgender speakers.
“I was at the DNC stumping, swallowing my pride that as the first Black trans woman to serve in public office, that I did not even get a speaking slot at the DNC,” Brady-Davis said. “I’m going to tell you there’s a disconnect.”
Some also questioned whether Democrats at the federal level would be effective or committed to protecting transgender rights during Trump’s second presidency. Since Trump’s win, two House Democrats have come out saying they oppose transgender athletes competing in women’s sports, including Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) and Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.), who told the New York Times, “I don’t want to discriminate against anybody, but I don’t think biological boys should be playing in girls’ sports.”
“We cannot have faith on the national level that the federal government will protect us,” one person said at the Nov. 7 gathering.
Building Illinois as a refuge for LGBTQ+ people
This potential rollback of LGBTQ+ rights at the federal level makes it even more important for people to organize locally to ensure Chicago and Illinois can be a safe haven for queer people.
“We are starting to get calls from other parts of the country from people who want to move to Illinois because of what’s coming in their states,” Ruiz-Velasco said. “We have to make sure we’re building the infrastructure to be able to receive people who are coming from other places, just like we receive people who are coming from other countries.”
Fortunately, this is something Illinois already has experience in from Trump’s first stint in the White House, when he pushed an aggressively anti-immigrant agenda and Illinois established itself as a sanctuary for those seeking refuge, Ruiz-Velasco said.
“During the last round of this, we were able to pass some of the most protective laws here in the state of Illinois to keep immigrant communities safe,” Ruiz-Velasco said. “We worked really closely in the community to push our elected officials to be bold and take not just defensive, but also proactive actions to make sure we kept building power. We’re going to do the same with the LGBTQ+ community.”
Speaking with reporters Thursday, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker promised to be a “warrior” who will ensure the state is “a refuge for those whose rights are being denied elsewhere,” according to a report from NBC Chicago.
Pritzker pointed to actions the state has already taken to protect LGBTQ+ people, including passing the Reproductive Health Act and a mandate that gender-affirming care be covered by insurers in the state.
“Over the years ahead, we’ll do more than just protect against the possible reversion to an agenda that threatens to take us backward,” Pritzker said.
A call to action
People can also find hope by looking at the generations of LGBTQ+ people who came before, several attendees at Equality Illinois’ event said.
Brady-Davis pointed to legendary transgender activists like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, who were leaders in the Stonewall Uprisings of 1969 that catalyzed the Gay Liberation Movement.
People can also look to the HIV/AIDS activists who seized control of the Food and Drug Administration headquarters in 1988 when President Ronald Reagan’s administration was ignoring the HIV epidemic that killed hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S., Brady-Davis said.
“Silence equals death, and that is the legacy of the LGBTQ+ community,” Brady-Davis said. “That is what Stonewall is all about: coming out of the shadows. It’s not pride Parades, rainbow flags and gay neighborhoods—it’s organizing amidst the resistance.”
Many of these early activists and leaders are still here, and they need to be included in today’s efforts to defend the LGBTQ+ community, said Don Bell, who chairs the Illinois Commission on LGBTQ+ Aging.
“My generation has lived through the Lavender Scare, Stonewall, our first pandemic of HIV/AIDS and so on and so on,” Bell said. “Get to know us old folks, because what we model for you is the fact that we can survive.”