The Human Rights Campaign Foundation (HRC Foundation), the public education, research, and policy arm of the Human Rights Campaign, the largest LGBTQ+ advocacy group in the United States, has released new data showing that there are more LGBTQ+ identifying people than ever before, just as the Trump administration continues efforts to minimize LGBTQ+ rights and visibility.

The data, released late last week, includes a multitude of updated population estimates for LGBTQ+ identifying people in the United States. It shows that a record-high 12% of U.S. adults — roughly 25.6 million people — identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or gender diverse.

The numbers were drawn from more than 2.4 million responses to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey collected between 2021 and 2024. The Household Pulse Survey is one of the last major federal data sources to include a gender identity measure before the Trump administration removed sexual orientation and gender identity questions from roughly 360 federal data collections.

HRC President Kelley Robinson spoke about the data, emphasizing that it shows not only that the LGBTQ+ community is bigger than the Trump administration would have Americans believe, but that LGBTQ+ Americans continue to be targeted for no reason other than being different.

“LGBTQ+ Americans are everywhere. There are 25 million of us across the country, and we now have critical mass in almost every state in the nation,” Robinson said in a statement. “We’re not a niche constituency, and no campaign, brand, or employer can afford to treat us like one.”

The survey also collected other important information about LGBTQ+ Americans.

40: The number of states with an LGBTQ+ population greater than 10%, plus the District of Columbia. This includes electoral battleground states such as Arizona (13.34%), Georgia (11.46%), Michigan (10.95%), New Hampshire (11.88%), North Carolina (10.56%), Ohio (11.29%), Pennsylvania (11.14%), and Texas (12.54%).

25.6 million: Number of U.S. adults who identify as LGBTQ+.

12% : Percentage of the adult population who identify as LGBTQ+.

More than half of all LGBTQ+ adults (53.8%) are between 18 and 34 — a signal of sustained, long-term growth in political and economic power as this generation ages into peak spending and voting years.

Other recent studies show that nearly 30% of the adult Gen Z population identifies as LGBTQ+.

The data also shows growing diversity across the community. Hispanic adults make up a larger share of the LGBTQ+ population (18%) than of non-LGBTQ+ adults (13%). Black adults make up a smaller share, about 9%, compared to 12%, reinforcing that LGBTQ+ identity cuts across every racial and ethnic community.

Bisexual+ people are the largest group, at over 7% of all U.S. adults.

Tari Hanneman, HRC Foundation’s senior director of research and education, spoke about how the White House’s recent decision to remove LGBTQ-specific data questions from federal surveys undermines the purpose of federal data collection: to collect data that accurately reflects the U.S. population, regardless of political ideology.

“Reliable data are essential for understanding who lives in this country and what our communities need to thrive,” Hanneman said. “Removing sexual orientation and gender identity questions from surveys like the one used for this analysis introduces significant gaps in this understanding. These findings show that LGBTQ+ people are a substantial and growing segment of the population, underscoring the need for our continued inclusion in data collection efforts.”

The data also included key demographics about the age of LGBTQ+ people, showing that younger Americans are increasingly more likely to identify as LGBTQ+, while overall, all age groups saw an increase in people self-identifying as LGBTQ+ in the data.

More than half of LGBTQ+ adults (approximately 54%) are younger than 35, compared with about 22% of non-LGBTQ+ adults. Adults ages 25–34 constitute roughly one-third of the LGBTQ+ adult population.

The data also shows a similar generational pattern within age groups. Nearly 32% of adults ages 18–24 and 22% of adults ages 25–34 identify as LGBTQ+, compared with approximately 12% of adults ages 35–44 and less than 8% of each older age group.

The data also included statistics on the education levels of LGBTQ+ Americans, indicating that they are more likely to have some college education or an associate degree than their non-LGBTQ+ peers.

LGBTQ+ adults are more likely (34.57%) to have an associate degree or some college experience and less likely to have only a high school education or less, or a graduate degree.

According to a report from the Williams Institute, a research organization dedicated to collecting and explaining data on LGBTQ+ people and related policy, during the first year of the second Trump administration, approximately 360 federal data collections removed at least one sexual orientation or gender identity measure, including 338 that removed gender identity measures and at least 60 that removed sexual orientation measures.

The Williams Institute, along with HRC, asserts that these changes diminish the federal government’s capacity to measure LGBTQ+ populations and understand their experiences and needs — something that should be detrimental to federal data collection and assessment, regardless of what political ideology one subscribes to.

In 2024, the Census Bureau conducted a large-scale test of questions on sexual orientation and gender identity for possible inclusion in the American Community Survey, the nation’s primary source of detailed demographic data. The test involved nearly half a million households, but the Bureau has not released the promised reports and datasets showing how those questions performed. In September 2025 Democracy Forward filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeking their release, alleging that the Census Bureau had unlawfully withheld the records.

The HRC Foundation also provided information about the methodology used to produce its estimates. The data uses weighted surveys conducted through its Community Insights research program. Community Insights is an opt-in research panel rather than a probability sample of the U.S. population; demographic benchmarks are used to adjust survey data so that respondents more closely reflect the broader LGBTQ+ adult population.

The HRC Foundation selected the Household Pulse Survey due to its large sample size, national probability-based design, detailed demographic data, separate measures for sexual orientation and gender identity, and availability of public-use survey weights.

The analysis includes 37 rounds of the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey conducted between 2021 and 2024, yielding 2,452,769 responses before exclusions for missing or imputed data.

HRC’s estimate of 12.03% is based on the Census Bureau’s self-administered Household Pulse Survey, while Gallup’s most recent estimate of 9% is based on telephone interviews and a different approach to measuring LGBTQ+ identity.

HRC has suggested that self-administered surveys may offer greater privacy when people answer sensitive questions, which may contribute to differences in disclosure.

The analysis classifies respondents as lesbian or gay, bisexual+, transgender, or gender-expansive. The bisexual+ category includes respondents who selected bisexual as well as those who selected another sexual identity not represented by the available categories. The transgender or gender-expansive classification is determined using respondents’ reported sex assigned at birth and current gender identity.

The move to remove LGBTQ+ people from federal data collection is just one of many things the Trump-Vance administration has taken to minimize — if not hide — LGBTQ+ people in the country.

From the anti-transgender military executive order, which attempted to bar new recruits and remove transgender military members already serving, signed in January 2025, to attempts to prohibit gender-affirming medical care in federal health care programs and all but destroy gender-affirming care for minors, the administration has pursued a series of policies affecting LGBTQ+ Americans.

The administration has also attempted to make biological sex the only definition of gender on federal paperwork, rolled back DEI programs across the federal government, and taken other steps affecting how LGBTQ+ people are represented and recognized in federal policy and data collection.

The Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network (now referred to as Glisten rather than GLSEN following a February rebrand) released its 13th National School Climate Survey on Tuesday, offering an often under-evaluated and under-addressed look at the realities LGBTQ students are dealing with within America’s K-12 schools.

The revised report provides new data points that could indicate the future of the current LGBTQ youth population, highlighting rising issues within school structures that often disproportionately impact LGBTQ students, while also offering a more “nuanced portrait” of how they are maneuvering these challenges.

The most alarming piece of data shows that “two in three students” reported feeling unsafe in school during the 2023–2024 school year due to their sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. That high number becomes clearer as other findings in the research corroborate the points made — especially for those who haven’t stepped into a modern American classroom recently — which seems to be the best way to get a sense of what it is like to learn in one.

An additional data point showing LGBTQ students’ heightened sense of insecurity is reinforced by the widespread and constant harassment students face for their sexuality or gender identity.

The survey found that 62 percent of students experienced verbal, physical, or online harassment based on sexual orientation, while 68 percent reported the same due to their gender identity or expression.

Fifty-three percent — slightly more than half of all respondents — said they faced LGBTQ-related discrimination, including being barred from using facilities aligned with their gender identity in schools.

The survey also highlights disparities within the community — particularly within the 2023–2024 data, which emphasizes the unique struggles faced by transgender and non-white students. Trans students reported that 86 percent of them avoided certain school spaces out of fear for their safety. Non-white LGBTQ students (including Black, Indigenous, and people of color, referred to in the data as BIPOC) face a particularly difficult time within schools, with 48 percent reporting harassment based on their race or ethnicity.

In addition to these high levels of harassment, survey respondents also noted that the broader political climate shaping Washington is impacting their daily experiences in negative ways. Many reported that school environments felt more hostile during the 2024–2025 school year amid escalating anti-LGBTQ rhetoric across the country, in the news, and within the White House as policy debates continue.

Despite these conditions — which attempt to generalize and adequately compare the discrimination, harassment, and bullying faced by LGBTQ students in K-12 schools — the report underscores that LGBTQ students are not easily categorized.

“Young people actually defy the static labels of victim or hero,” said Glisten CEO Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, speaking to the Washington Blade at a reception for the data’s release. “They are neither all downtrodden nor all resilient — they are complicated and multifaceted. What we are finding through our research is that they are actually creating solutions with and for each other. They understand they can’t rely on these systems, so they are doing something themselves.”

That dual reality — that LGBTQ students appear hyper-resilient amid systemic failure in school systems that make their experiences more difficult — is a defining theme of this year’s findings.

“There’s a resilience and a power and a clarity in young people that says there is no use in trying to change who I am because I am who I am,” Willingham-Jaggers said at the event held in the NEA building. “What is also true is that a super hostile political environment is really terrible for everyone’s mental health, including children. It ought not be on a 13-year-old or a 16-year-old to keep themselves safe. That’s what parents are for, that’s what adults in schools are for, and that’s what education is supposed to do.”

She added that the data reflects broader institutional shortcomings, especially as many attempts to fix these systemic issues continue to fall short or worsen conditions for the most marginalized. Trans people of color often face the worst instances of discrimination, harassment, and bullying, and the structures in place to alleviate these issues can sometimes make them worse.

“Unfortunately, our leaders and our institutions are failing our children,” she said, pointing out that education should serve as a pathway out of adversity and into a better future. “Education is supposed to be helping our young people connect with each other, and allow for them to envision a world so they can leave school, and come out into the world, and be leaders … I think you can take the moral temperature of a country by how they treat their children. And we are — the collective ‘we,’ personified by our leaders — failing our children.”

Despite the troubling data highlighting how difficult it is to be an LGBTQ K-12 student today, the survey points to clear pathways for improvement.

These include being upfront and inclusive with LGBTQ students in a variety of ways. When schools provide comprehensive anti-bullying policies, LGBTQ students reported they were more likely to look forward to school and feel like they belonged. This also extends to expanding sex education to include often-overlooked sexual and gender minorities. Increased instances of positive LGBTQ inclusion were linked to better academic performance, attendance, and overall belonging, while negative depictions and exclusionary practices were linked to worse outcomes.

A major positive finding of the study is that when LGBTQ students reported having access to supportive educators, inclusive curricula, explicit anti-bullying policies, and Gender and Sexuality Alliances (GSAs), they also reported higher GPAs and a stronger sense of belonging — suggesting that even small, targeted policy shifts can meaningfully improve outcomes.

In a statement accompanying the report, Willingham-Jaggers emphasized the importance of listening to students’ experiences in full, which they acknowledged can be difficult to capture.

“LGBTQ+ youth, including intersex, asexual, and two-spirit students, are whole people with complex lives that defy the tired boxes of ‘victim’ or ‘leader’ into which they are so often placed,” she said. “Safety is not just the absence of harm; it is active affirmation. At a moment when young people’s identities are being debated and restricted, this study speaks truth to a menacing power.”

Researchers behind the survey also noted a shift in methodology this year, incorporating more qualitative data through student focus groups. By broadening beyond strictly quantitative measures, the data offers a deeper understanding of students’ lived experiences and strengthens the overall findings.

“Similar to previous findings, we continue to find that schools continue to be hostile sites for LGBTQ+ students and in particular for trans and gender-expanding students and BIPOC students,” said Yu-Chi Wang and Shweta Moorthy. “Students provided us with more context and emotion behind our findings … helping us better understand what was happening in our schools and brainstorm ways we can improve it.”

For Willingham-Jaggers, the stakes extend beyond education alone and into the kind of adults these students will become — and, for some, the leaders who will shape the future. By instilling the values of understanding, equality, and democracy early, young people are better equipped to navigate future challenges and reshape the systems they inherit.

“Education is the cornerstone of democracy,” she said. “Education provides an immune system for autocracy. Democracy is born anew every generation, and education is its midwife. We need young people to be ready to build a future that is bigger than the tiny, weak vision of those currently in power.”

Even in a moment she described as “dark and frightening,” Willingham-Jaggers framed the report as both a warning and a call to action. “I feel really privileged to be leading this organization at this moment, because this moment is really critical,” she said. “I’m glad it’s me building the team and envisioning with our young people the future that we’re trying to build.”

The report concludes by recognizing the many organizations that contributed to the development of its findings. Focus group partners included Able South Carolina, Advocates for Youth, Freedom Oklahoma, interACT: Advocates for Intersex Youth, Louisville Youth Group, the Montrose Center, National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance, National Black Justice Collective, Trans Mentor Project, and Youth Celebrate Diversity. Additional organizations — including GenderCool, Immigration Equality, interACT, SIECUS, and UnidosUS — also helped review and update the survey.

The methodology and data collection instruments used in Glisten’s 2025 National School Climate Survey were reviewed and approved by an independent Institutional Review Board, ensuring the study met established ethical standards and best practices for research involving human subjects.

The full report can be accessed at Glisten’s website at glisten.org.

A new study by the Human Rights Campaign shows House Republicans continue to push anti-LGBTQ legislation, despite overwhelming nationwide support for nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ people.

The study found that Trump-supporting Republicans are attempting to pass 52 anti-LGBTQ riders—unofficial amendments to legislation with little chance of passing on their own—across 12 of the must-pass FY26 federal appropriations bills.

If enacted, these riders would become a significant vehicle for undermining LGBTQ+ equality.

The riders impose broad anti-LGBTQ measures, including blocking gender-affirming care, erasing sexual orientation and gender identity data, restricting nondiscrimination protections, limiting support for LGBTQ+ communities, targeting global LGBTQ+ rights and public health, interfering in medical decisions, and curtailing LGBTQ+ participation in sports, education, and civic life.

In addition to the riders, congressional Republicans have used the rescissions process—where the government takes back money already approved for programs deemed no longer necessary—to remove funding from Biden-era programs that have served as major lifelines for the most vulnerable members of the LGBTQ community, particularly low-income individuals, transgender youth, and people living with or at high risk for HIV.

Together, these efforts, combined with an already hostile White House eager to remove funding from anything deemed too “woke” or “wasteful,” have created a sizable gap in federal funding for programs once seen as foundational. Funding for nondiscrimination, public health, housing, and civil rights is now at risk, as Republicans follow Trump’s lead.

The HRC report shows that these proposed bills would drastically affect many aspects of LGBTQ existence, highlighting actions that will harm LGBTQ Americans.

These include establishing a “First Amendment Defense Act,” which allows individuals, businesses, universities, and federally funded agencies to refuse services to LGBTQ+ people in the name of personal belief; pushing drag bans on military bases and in U.S. foreign aid programming; minimizing gender-affirming care by reducing funding and punishing medical providers; and even applying a global gag rule to gender-affirming care in U.S.-supported foreign assistance programs.

The study also highlights attempts to block Medicaid and Medicare reimbursement for gender-affirming care and efforts to restrict PrEP, HIV testing, and sexual health services—policies that will particularly harm transgender people. It details extensive Republican efforts to redefine “sex” as strictly biological in standalone bills, appearing in riders that would gut Section 1557 protections and affect access to HIV prevention, Ryan White services, Title X reproductive health, and HOPWA housing programs.

Additional bills listed criminalize or stigmatize LGBTQ identity and are informing restrictions on community health education, HIV prevention campaigns, school-based health centers, and public health research funding at the CDC and NIH.

“This country deserves leadership that uses its power to help meet the needs of the people. Instead, MAGA Republicans make everything about attacking transgender people,” said David Stacy, Human Rights Campaign Vice President of Government Affairs.

“They have now spent three years attempting to poison these must-pass bills with anti-LGBTQ+ riders that polarize the House appropriations process and weaponize the federal government against our community, while doing nothing to address the urgent needs of their constituents. The American people have been clear: anti-equality politicians should stop shirking responsibility and actually serve all of their constituents. Pro-equality members of Congress must defeat the latest wave of anti-LGBTQ+ provisions and hold the line against hate.”

On election night, HRC released a memo showing anti-trans ad campaigns are failing and Americans overwhelmingly support equality. Nearly two-thirds of Americans back federal nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people, including 58% of independents and 42% of Republicans.

Almost 7 in 10 say politicians are too uninformed about transgender youth healthcare to make fair policies, and nearly half think lawmakers shouldn’t focus on transgender issues at all. And 70% percent worry politicians are targeting LGBTQ youth to divide the country and score political points.