Transgender Montana Representative Zooey Zephyr and her fiancée, trans activist and journalist Erin Reed, said if Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and fellow Republican lawmakers continue to push “hateful and discriminatory” laws, they’ll end up “footnotes” in history.
Zephyr and Reed told Newsweek in a phone interview on Saturday evening that they are traveling across the United States to attend Pride Month events to express support for LGBTQ+ rights as a growing number of states pass laws that they say target the community. From January to mid-February, there were more than 300 bills anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in U.S. statehouses, according to advocacy group Human Rights Campaign (HRC). The group said dozens of states have already approved a range of anti-LGBTQ+ laws from banning drag shows and books to restricting access to gender affirming healthcare.
Ilya S. Savenok, Sean Rayford/Getty
Zephyr, the first transgender lawmaker elected to the Montana legislature, made headlines recently after her colleagues voted to bar her from the House floor in April. While Republicans argued she broke decorum during debate on a bill that bans gender-affirming care for minors, her censure sparked an avalanche of criticism and incited protests at the statehouse. Zephyr filed a lawsuit to challenge the punishment, but a judge dismissed the lawsuit last month.
Zephyr and Reed said they felt it was important to stop in Florida where they said the “worst” laws have been passed.
Newsweek also reached out via email to representatives for DeSantis and Transpire Help for comment.
“For the LGBTQ community here in Florida, another year has passed with a ton of anti-queer legislation and anti-LGBTQ legislation, and they have targeted us in every way imaginable from bathrooms and schools, to our medication, our books, our history,” Reed told Newsweek. “But we’re still here, and we celebrate that today.”
Florida enacted six anti-LGBTQ laws as of March, according to Human Rights Campaign, which the group said in an online statement is a “record-shattering number” of laws designed to “scale back the freedoms of LGBTQ+ people.” The wave of legislation sparked LGBTQ+ advocacy group Equality Florida to issue a travel advisory in April to the community. The civil rights organization pointed to the slew of anti-LGBTQ+ laws, saying Florida has become “hostile” to the community.
Despite the travel warning, Zephyr and Reed traveled to Florida to speak at Pride on the Block in West Palm Beach. The annual Pride event took place Friday and Saturday and raised money for Transpire Help, which is a nonprofit organization that serves the LGBTQ+ community in Palm Beach County. Transpire Help offers numerous services, including addiction treatment, healthcare and housing.
Reed and Zephyr both spoke Saturday evening during the two-day Pride event, which also featured music, vendors and games.
Zephyr told Newsweek that she felt it “more important than ever” to come to Florida to stand up for the LGBTQ+ community, saying the legislative “attacks” happening across the country usually get their first pass in the sunshine state.
“It felt important to come to a place like Florida and show that we recognize that our fight, and that these discriminatory policies don’t end at state borders,” she said. “I wanted to show that we were willing to come down here and plant the flag of queer joy and say, ‘we are not going back into the closet.’ You can pass these laws, but you will not make us afraid.”
Zephyr and Reed assailed DeSantis, who launched his 2024 presidential campaign last month, saying his state is inflicting “horror” on the community. Zephyr said LGBTQ+ people are part of what it means to “be an American” and that they have rights like everyone else in this country.
“If DeSantis and others like him continue to push this hateful and discriminatory legislation, they will find what everyone else like them has found throughout history,” Zephyr said. “They will wind up in footnotes of history because love wins in the end.”
Zephyr and Reed said despite the Florida legislature taking aim at the community, the atmosphere at the Pride event in downtown West Palm Beach was “joyous.”
“In spite of all of the horror that this Florida legislature is trying to inflict on the community, the biggest storyline in LGBTQ history has always been that love and joy win,” Reed said.
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