Kansas City PrideFest

Kansas City's PrideFest kicks off this weekend. But as the festival celebrates its 50th anniversary, organizers say that anti-LGBTQ rhetoric has cost the group $200,000 in sponsorships.

As Kansas City’s Pride Month celebrations mark their 50th anniversary this year, festival organizers say anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric from the Trump administration has caused a severe loss of sponsorships. Even with a reduced budget, PrideFest plans to bring new resources to help fill a growing gap for the LGBTQ+ community.

Legislatures in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska, passed new laws decried by LGBTQ+ communities and their allies. Still, the month of June brought exuberant Pride celebrations around the region.

The Kansas City Pride Community Alliance held its annual parade and PrideFest this weekend. Despite recent political attacks from Kansas and Missouri lawmakers, and a suspected pellet gun attack at a local LGBTQ+ bar last weekend, attendees used the time to get to know each other and find joy in the shared community.

Organizers expect that Kansas City’s 2023 PrideFest and parade should draw about 50,000 people this weekend. But recent anti-LGBTQ policies, plus an attack last weekend at Fountain Haus in Westport, have stoked safety concerns for many event-goers.

Kansas City’s first Pride parade in 1977 was spearheaded by Lea Hopkins, whose organizing sparked a wider gay rights movement that continues today. But it was only a few weeks after that successful event that Hopkins found herself on the defense again, when a prominent anti-gay activist came on a crusade through town.