WorldPride relocates events scheduled for the Kennedy Center
The Capital Pride Alliance will move events celebrating LGBTQ+ rights it had scheduled for the Kennedy Center this spring as part of the WorldPride Festival 'to ensure our entire LGBTQ+ community will be welcome,' the organization said in a statement.
The Tapestry of Pride programs, featuring sections of the AIDS Memorial Quilt, a reading room and a drag story time, will now be held at the WorldPride Welcome Center in downtown Washington, the alliance said.
The three-week long WorldPride festival, which begins May 17, is expected to bring 2 million to 3 million people to the nation's capital, including tens of thousands of international visitors. Organizers have lined up major performers, including Shakira, Jennifer Lopez, Troye Sivan, Doechii and Cynthia Erivo; and the event is also intended to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Washington's first gay pride events in 1975.
'WorldPride is happening and it is essential to our community both in the US and around the world that we continue to be seen and our voices heard,' June Crenshaw, deputy director of the alliance, said in the statement.
A Kennedy Center spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on Capital Pride's decision to relocate its programming.
WorldPride's changes follow cancellations or withdrawals of other performances at the Kennedy Center, including a May 21 concert pairing the Gay Men's Chorus of Washington, DC, with the National Symphony Orchestra. And it comes in the wake of President Donald Trump's move earlier this year to install himself as chairman of the Kennedy Center and remake its role in American life.
''NO MORE DRAG SHOWS, OR OTHER ANTI-AMERICAN PROPAGANDA – ONLY THE BEST'.' Trump wrote in a social media post in February announcing Richard Grenell, former acting director of national intelligence and U.S. ambassador to Germany, as the center's executive director. 'Ric shares my Vision for a GOLDEN AGE of American Arts and Culture, and will be overseeing the daily operations of the Center.'
Since Trump's takeover, the center has laid off employees working in government relations, social media, campus planning and other projects, staff have said. More than a dozen other employees have resigned.
Michael Roest, founder and director of the International Pride Orchestra, said his group's June 5 performance at the Kennedy Center was abruptly canceled within days of Trump's takeover.
Roest told the Associated Press he was in the final stages of planning the Kennedy Center performance after months of emails and Zoom calls. He was waiting on a final contract when Trump posted on social media on Feb. 7 of the leadership changes and his intention to transform the center's programming.
The Kennedy Center immediately became nonresponsive, Roest said. On Feb. 12, he told the AP, he received a one-sentence email from a Kennedy Center staffer saying: 'We are no longer able to advance your contract at this time.'
Roest said he never received an explanation as to why the performance was canceled so late in the planning stages. He said his orchestra would no longer consider performing at the Kennedy Center, and he believes most queer artists would make the same choice.
'There would need to be a very, very public statement of inclusivity from the administration, from that board, for us to consider that,' he said. 'Otherwise it is a hostile performance space.'
This is not the first time WorldPride has been caught in the swirl of the Trump administration's policies. After Trump announced an executive order targeting companies with diversity, equity and inclusion programs, federal contractor Booz Allen Hamilton withdrew its sponsorship of the festival.
A number of international groups, concerned about the Trump administration's attacks on DEI efforts and its targeting of transgender rights in the United States, have said they are planning to stay away from the festival. In February, Canada's largest gay rights organization, Egale Canada, said it would not take part in any events held in the United States, including WorldPride.
There is 'a lack of human decency when it comes to how this administration wants to engage with or not engage with members of the LGBTI community,' said Helen Kennedy, Egale Canada's executive director. 'I didn't think it was safe for my staff, specifically my gender diverse staff, to go, and so this is the position that we've taken.'
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