No Pride in Detention: Trans Immigrant Activist Skips WH Event, Urges Support for LGBTQ Asylum Seekers

We speak with Jennicet Gutierrez, an organizer and co-executive director of Familia: Trans Queer Liberation Movement, who declined an invitation to attend the annual White House Pride Month celebration to protest the detention and deportation of LGBTQ immigrants and asylum seekers. At the U.S.-Mexico border, trans people in detention centers are reportedly being misgendered, denied access to essential healthcare, held in inhumane conditions or blocked altogether from entering the country due to the Trump-era Title 42. Roxsana Hernandez Rodriguez, a trans asylum seeker from Honduras, died while in ICE custody. Regarding Biden's recent executive orders to establish some protections against anti-LGBTQ discrimination, Gutierrez says, We cannot just applaud and say, 'Yes, you've done enough,' when, no, that's the least you can do."