National
Gallup: More Americans identify as LGBTQ+ than ever before
Gallup noted that its pre-2020 polling did not ask adults which category LGBTQ+ category they identified with

A record 7.1% of adults in the U.S. identify as LGBTQ+, which doubles the percentage from 10 years ago, a Gallup poll found.
The survey, released Thursday, notes that the “increase in LGBT identification in recent years largely reflects the higher prevalence of such identities among the youngest U.S. adults compared with the older generations they are replacing in the U.S. adult population.”

Generation Z, especially, fueled the increase, with nearly 21% of 18 to 25-year-olds identifying as LGBTQ+ – which is nearly double the proportion of millennials, born between 1981 and 1996, who do so, according to Gallup. The gap widens further when compared to older generations.
Gallup asked more than 12,000 U.S. adults how they identified last year to get the results. Around 86% of people said they are straight or heterosexual, while 6.6% did not offer an opinion. It has measured LGBTQ+ identification since 2012.
In Gallup’s 2017 survey, Gen Z made up 7% of the national sample but accounted for 12% in its most recent poll as more from that generation reached age 18 over the past four years. The proportion of adults born before 1946 has fallen from 11% to 8% in the same period of time.

The high rate of LGBTQ-identifying adults results from young adults coming to terms with their sexuality or gender identity, as more and more Americans accept LGBTQ+ people and queer individuals enjoy increasing legal protection against discrimination, Gallup said.
The analytics giant also predicted that the proportion of LGBTQ+ Americans should exceed 10% in the near future.
“Given the large disparities in LGBT identification between younger and older generations of Americans, the proportion of all Americans who identify as LGBT can be expected to grow in the future as younger generations will constitute a larger share of the total U.S. adult population,” Gallup noted.
Joni Madison, the interim president of the Human Rights Campaign, said the poll emphasizes “the need to codify legal protections against discrimination and implement LGBTQ+ inclusive data collection at federal, state, local and private levels.”
“With more LGBTQ+ people than ever before living openly and embracing their identity, the fight for LGBTQ+ equality in America must continue to represent this ever-growing and beautiful community,” she said.
Last year, as Gallup conducted the poll, more state legislatures introduced anti-LGBTQ+ bills than ever before in recent history. The Trans community felt the brunt of the legislative attacks, with bills aimed at banning Trans women and girls from sports and criminalizing gender-affirming care for minors showing up in statehouses all over the nation.
The rate of LGBTQ-identifying people was stable in older generations – traditionalists, born before 1946, baby boomers, born between 1946-1964, and Generation X, born between 1965-1980 – while it increased in younger ones, according to the poll.
There was a “modest uptick among” millennials, from 5.8% in 2012 to 7.8% in 2017 and 10.5% currently. The percentage of Gen Z who are LGBTQ+ nearly doubled since 2017, “when only the leading edge of that generation — those born between 1997 and 1999 — had reached adulthood.”

“Should that trend within Gen Z continue, the proportion of U.S. adults in that generation who say they are LGBT will grow even higher once all members of the generation reach adulthood,” Gallup said.
In addition, the survey found that bisexual was the most common identification among LGBTQ+ Americans, with more than half, 57%, indicating they are bisexual. Of the total population, 4% said that they were bisexual.
Gallup noted that its pre-2020 polling did not ask adults which category LGBTQ+ category they identified with, but other research organizations and Gallup’s 2020 results have consistently found bisexual adults to be the most common LGBTQ+ people. Previous analyses showed bisexuals are much more likely to marry spouses or live with partners of a different sex, according to company.

Meanwhile, 21% of LGBT Americans said they were gay, 14% lesbian, 10% transgender and 4% something else – all which accounted for under 2% of the total population.
Bisexual was the most common identifier in Gen Z, millennials, and Gen X. At the same time, older Americans are just as likely to say they are gay or lesbian as they are bisexual, the survey showed. Overall, 15% of Gen Z, 6% of millennials and nearly 2% of Gen X said they are bisexual.
Additionally, women are more likely to identify as bisexual than men. In contrast, men are more likely to identify as gay than bisexual and women are more likely to be bisexual than lesbian.


The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
The Comings & Goings column also invites LGBTQ college students to share their successes with us. If you have been elected to a student government position, gotten an exciting internship, or are graduating and beginning your career with a great job, let us know so we can share your success.
Congratulations to Ted Lewis M.ED. on being named executive director of Rainbow Families. On their appointment they said, “Right now, when we are facing tremendous opposition to our very existence, is the time to build up our community and our community resources. LGBTQ+ families are innovative, supportive, loving, and resilient and we will need all those tools and more in this moment. My hope as Rainbow Families’ Executive Director is to expand our membership and welcome the vast community resources, expertise, and lived experiences to support new family formation and new parents. I hope to bring education, advocacy and support to LGBTQ+ families, parents, and prospective parents when we are worried about our rights disappearing. I’m also excited to join the joyous and thriving community at Rainbow Families and expand on fun events that bring families together from our weekend camping trip, to picking pumpkins at Cox Farms, and dancing at family parties. It is within a beloved community that we can both prepare for challenges ahead and celebrate our fabulousness together.”
Prior to this, Lewis served as director of Youth Well-Being for the Human Rights Campaign Foundation. Lewis served as project manager for Project THRIVE, a multi-year campaign with 30+ national organizations committed to the thriving of LGBTQ youth resulting in industry specific resources and professional development on LGBTQ best practices. Lewis was also founder and CEO of Ted Lewis Consulting, advising K-12 school districts, Fortune 500 companies, higher education institutions, and non-profits on LGBTQ inclusive practices. They also served as assistant director for Sexual/Gender Diversity, UNC Charlotte, responsible for LGBTQ student programming as well as Men’s & Women’s programming for the institution. Lewis has presented on numerous panels including: “Othermuvas: How Black LGBTQ+ Chosen Families Provide Support to Black LGBTQ+ Youth” National Mentoring Summit, 2025; “Addressing the Issues of LGBTQ+ Cultural Competency, Parity and Inconsistency” Richmond Bench-Bar Conference, 2019; and “The Unmasking: Race & Reality in Richmond” Richmond Magazine Panel, 2017. Lewis was named in Style Weekly’s 40 Under 40, in 2018; and received the VA Pride Firework Award in 2019.
Lewis earned a bachelor’s degree in English and History, University of Mary Washington; Master of Education, University of South Carolina, and an Education Master Certificate in Women & Gender Studies, University of North Carolina, Charlotte.
Federal Government
Garcia writes to HHS Secretary about the dismantling of HIV programs in Trump’s second term
Out congressman was elected top Democrat on House Oversight on June 24

U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, sent a letter on Thursday to U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. demanding answers about the Trump-Vance administration’s “systematic” elimination of programs to fight HIV in the U.S. and around the world.
Also signed by Democratic Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, the letter requests information about cuts to federal support for HIV research, including vaccine development efforts, the shuttering of the HIV prevention division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the defunding of programs providing HIV treatment and prevention services since President Donald Trump returned to the White House.
The lawmakers requested responses by or before the end of July.
“It is shameful that HHS Secretary RFK Jr. and the Trump Administration are working to dismantle our HIV research, care, and prevention programs aimed at eradicating the disease across the world,” Garcia said. “This decision is absolutely reckless and puts millions of lives at risk. Oversight Democrats refuse to let Secretary Kennedy’s reliance on conspiracy theories and misinformation threaten the health and safety of our public health.”
“The Trump Administration’s reckless decision to gut HIV prevention and research programs is not only scientifically indefensible—it’s morally unconscionable. These cuts jeopardize the health of millions, both at home and abroad, and reverse decades of bipartisan progress in the fight against HIV/AIDS,” Krishnamoorthi said. “We’re demanding answers because the American people, and the global community, deserve better than politically motivated neglect of public health.”
Echoing warnings from HIV and public health experts, the congressmen in their letter stressed that backsliding in efforts to fight the disease at home and abroad come just as advancements in treatment and prevention have finally put some of the most ambitious goals to end the epidemic within reach.
The letter suggests that Kennedy’s embrace of misinformation about HIV might explain, to some extent, his dismantling of programs to end the epidemic at home and abroad, specifically, pointing to the secretary’s history of challenging the overwhelming and longstanding scientific and medical consensus about the causal relationship between HIV and AIDS.
The congressmen also detailed many of the real-world consequences of health policy concerning HIV in Trump’s second term. For example, they note experts anticipate there will be millions of excess new HIV infections and hundreds of thousands of excess HIV-related deaths in Sub-Saharan Africa in just one year.
The letter also warns that “President Trump’s Fiscal Year 2026 budget request for domestic HIV program calls for a $1.5 billion reduction in funding,” which “could lead to more than 143,000 additional HIV cases in the United States within five years and about 127,000 additional deaths from HIV and AIDS-related causes.”
Garcia’s leadership of Oversight Dems will be closely watched
If Democrats recapture a majority of seats in the House next year, Garcia becomes chair of the committee and has access to far more powerful tools to exercise oversight — like the authority to issue subpoenas (unilaterally or by majority vote) compelling witnesses to testify or requiring officials to turn over documents.
Leadership positions, especially coveted spots leading the most powerful committees in Congress, are typically awarded based on seniority. When the House Democratic caucus elected Garcia on June 24, it marked the first first time in more than a century that a second-term member was selected for the role.
During his brief time in Washington, the congressman, who is openly gay and formerly served as mayor of Long Beach, has emerged as arguably one of the strongest communicators in the House Democratic caucus and one of his party’s most vocal critics of the second Trump administration.
Thursday’s letter, which comes less than a month after his election as ranking member, may signal how Garcia will approach fact finding missions and investigations, or where he will focus the committee’s work, under the vastly expanded powers that might be available to him after the midterms.
National
Trump threatens Rosie O’Donnell’s citizenship
Comedian responds with post linking him to Epstein

Donald Trump threatened to revoke Rosie O’Donnell’s U.S. citizenship last weekend amid his administration’s pattern of targeting people with whom he has publicly disagreed.
The actress and comedian, known for her roles in major motion pictures like “A League of Their Own” and “Harriet the Spy,” was singled out by the president on his social media app Truth Social, where he called the lesbian entertainer a “Threat to Humanity.”
“Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship,” Trump also posted. “[She] should remain in the wonderful Country of Ireland, if they want her. GOD BLESS AMERICA!”
In response to the post—which reignites a decade-old feud between the two—O’Donnell shared a collage of photos from her time in Ireland, along with an old photo of Trump with convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“The president of the usa has always hated the fact that i see him for who he is – a criminal con man sexual abusing liar out to harm our nation to serve himself,” the former talk show host posted on Instagram. She continued, “this is why i moved to ireland – he is a dangerous old soulless man with dementia who lacks empathy compassion and basic humanity – i stand in direct opposition [to] all he represents – so do millions of others – u gonna deport all who stand against ur evil tendencies – ur a bad joke who cant form a coherent sentence.”
Trump’s threat is both irregular and constitutionally unsound. The Supreme Court has ruled over multiple decades that stripping someone of their citizenship violates the Constitution—and the 14th Amendment.
Three Supreme Court cases in particular—Trop v. Dulles (1958), Afroyim v. Rusk (1967), and Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969)—have all affirmed that once legally obtained, citizenship is not something that can simply be revoked, even if the president disagrees with what a person says or does. In Afroyim v. Rusk, the Supreme Court wrote: “In our country the people are sovereign and the Government cannot sever its relationship to the people by taking away their citizenship.”
This authoritarian threat echoes Trump’s broader efforts to undermine birthright citizenship, which has been a foundational part of the U.S. Constitution since the ratification of the 14th amendment.
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