Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Monday announced he will resign as the leader of his Liberal Party.

The announcement, which came against the backdrop of growing calls for the embattled prime minister to resign that increased after Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who was the country’s deputy prime minister, stepped down from the government last month, will set the stage for national elections that must take place before Oct. 20.

CNN notes polls show the Liberal Party would lose to the Conservative Party of which anti-LGBTQ MP Pierre Poilievre is the leader.

Trudeau became prime minister in 2015 when he defeated then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Trudeau’s father, Pierre Trudeau, was Canada’s prime minister from 1968-1979 and from 1980-1984.

The younger Trudeau is the first Canadian prime minister to have marched in a Pride parade.

Canada in 2022 banned so-called conversion therapy, which Justin Trudeau described as a “hateful and harmful practice.” Justin Trudeau in 2017 also formally apologized to Canadians who suffered persecution and discrimination under the country’s anti-LGBTQ laws — including those convicted of “gross indecency” before Canada decriminalized consensual same-sex sexual relations — and policies

“We have failed to (protect) LGBTQ2 communities, individuals time and time again,” he said. “It is with shame and sorrow and deep regret that the things we have done that I stand here today and say we were wrong, we apologize. I am sorry. We are sorry.”

The Washington Blade will update this story.

Toronto Pride parade organizers on Sunday cancelled the annual event after a group of pro-Palestinian protesters disrupted it.

Media reports indicate more than two dozen protesters blocked the parade near the intersection of Yonge and Wellesley Streets, and chanted “from the river to the sea” and “Pride was a riot.”

The pro-Palestinian protestors that brought the Toronto Pride Parade to a stop chant the genocidal “From the river to the sea” slogan as they continue to block the parade’s path.

Footage by @BethBaisch pic.twitter.com/SMldTpLFvk

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) June 30, 2024

The Toronto Star reported the protesters disrupted the parade at around 5:30 p.m., more than three hours after it began. Toronto Pride around 45 minutes later announced the parade’s cancellation.

“Today, we made the decision to cancel the remainder of the Pride Parade out of our commitment to ensuring public safety,” they said in a statement. “While we deeply respect and uphold everyone’s right to peacefully protest, our foremost priority is the well-being of all participants and spectators.”

“We recognize the Pride parade as a highly anticipated event that many organizations and individuals eagerly prepare for,” it added. “We empathize with those who were looking forward to participating and regret any inconvenience caused by this decision.”

The Coalition Against Pinkwashing organized the protest.

Protesters disrupt NYC Pride parade

This year’s Pride Month took place eight months after Hamas launched its surprise attack against southern Israel.

The Israeli government says Hamas militants killed roughly 1,200 people on Oct. 7, 2023, including at least 260 partygoers and others at the Nova Music Festival. The Israeli government says upwards of 80 people who were taken hostage on Oct. 7 remain alive in the Gaza Strip.

The Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry says more than 35,000 people have died in the enclave since the war began. The National LGBTQ Task Force and Outright International are among the groups that have called for a ceasefire.

The New York Daily News reported the New York Police Department on Sunday arrested 10 pro-Palestinian protesters who disrupted the city’s annual Pride parade near the Stonewall Inn. The newspaper said those who the NYPD took into custody, among other things, threw red paint onto a pickup truck inside police barricades.

The Telegraph on Saturday reported London police arrested more than 30 pro-Palestinian activists to prevent them from disrupting the city’s annual Pride parade that took place on the same day.

A Wider Bridge, a group that “advocates for justice, counters LGBTQphobia, and fights antisemitism and other forms of hatred,” last month called upon Pride organizers to ensure Jewish can safely participate in their events.

Pride festivals in two of Canada’s most politically conservative provinces are putting their feet down and barring lawmakers who are pushing anti-transgender legislation from participating in Pride festivities this season.

This week, nine Pride festivals across Alberta — including those in the largest cities Calgary and Edmonton — put out a joint statement that they will “not allow the participation of the United Conservative Party (UCP) in our 2024 Pride celebrations.” The move came days after several Pride festivals in neighboring Saskatchewan announced they had barred the conservative Saskatchewan Party from participating in their parades.

Both provinces have recently passed or announced policies that would harm trans youth. 

Last year, Saskatchewan enacted a regulation that would require schools to out gender non-conforming children to their parents, and when the regulation was struck down by a court, the government enacted a law using the “notwithstanding” rule that allows governments to circumvent the federal Charter of Rights.

In January, Alberta’s conservative government announced it would bring forward legislation in the fall to ban gender confirming surgeries on minors, restrict hormone treatment for minors under 16, bar trans children from playing in gender-appropriate school sports, and require parental notification for students to use a preferred name or pronoun.

“This is a direct response to Premier Danielle Smith’s stated intention to infringe on the rights, freedoms, and healthcare of the transgender community in Alberta,” the statement put out by the Alberta Pride organizations reads. “You may not join our celebrations in June when you plan to attack us in September.” 

“Queer rights should not be a political decision. Trans rights are human rights. We invite Premier Smith to re-consider her harmful and damaging policies and engage in meaningful discussions with the Two Spirit, Trans, Nonbinary, and Queer community.”

Other Pride festivals barring the UCP from participating include festivals in Red Deer, Lethbridge, Banff, Canmore, Lacombe, Jasper, Fort Saskatchewan, and Okotoks. The statement was also joined by three queer service organizations.

“When queer people are being attacked by our government, we come together and get things done,” says James Demers, a community organizer with Queer Citizens United, the umbrella organization of Alberta Pride societies that put together the statement. 

Queen City Pride, which organizes the annual Pride festival in Saskatchewan’s capital of Regina, was the first city to announce that it would not allow the Saskatchewan Party to participate in its events.

“We decided as a board that we might have to put some distance between us and the Saskatchewan Party. We were very hopeful that they would change course, but they’ve gone against our Charter of Rights. We’re not ok with this, and they’re not backing down,” says Queen City Pride Co-Executive Director Riviera Bonneau.

The Saskatchewan Party has participated in the Queen City Pride in the past, with Premier Scott Moe even marching in the parade in 2019. At the time, he told CTV News he believed it was the “right thing for a premier to do.”

“The thing that triggered our announcement was that the Saskatchewan Party had put forward a registration to participate in our parade,” Bonneau says. “I don’t know why they’d want to participate, but they did try.”

Bonneau says she communicated with other Pride festivals in the province before announcing the decision publicly, as she didn’t want to pressure other festivals to make the same decision. In the event, Pride festivals in Prince Albert, Moose Jaw, Swift Current, and the Battlefords announced that they would not allow the Saskatchewan Party to participate, while a spokesperson for Saskatoon Pride told CBC that it would carefully vet any application to participate, and the Party would be unlikely to be accepted.

While the federal Conservative Party has offered support for the anti-trans policies announced by both provinces, Bonneau says her organization has not banned the federal party yet for a simple reason: it hasn’t applied to participate. 

But Demers says his group’s stance is that the federal Conservatives are not welcome at the member festivals either.

“They’re not any nicer to us than the UCP are. I think the consequence extends to them as well,” he says.

Demers says that the federal Conservative Party often applies to participate in Alberta’s Pride festivals, but is typically rejected.

“We have an application process for all of our Prides, and they never pass the process. They’ll typically hold a barbeque somewhere and call it a Pride event, but they have not been invited,” Demers says. “We’ve now formally disinvited them. We would not like them to show up and pretend that they care about us as their constituents. It’s us making it clear that they are not welcome.”