Portion of Americans satisfied with US stance on LGBTQ is lowest in decade

USA Today

05-02-2025

The portion of Americans satisfied with the country's attitudes toward gay and lesbian people in the United States has dipped to the lowest levels in more than a decade, just as President Donald Trump begins his second term.
That's according to Gallup's annual Mood of the Nation Survey, conducted in January just before Trump took office. The annual survey asks respondents to indicate how they feel about the state of the nation on a number of issues, such as crime, abortion and race relations.
The 2025 survey, which collected responses from 1,005 adults in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, asked respondents to express their levels of satisfaction or dissatisfaction regarding acceptance of gay and lesbian people in the U.S. However, "it does not tell us why they are satisfied or dissatisfied," said Gallup's Justin McCarthy.
According to the survey, 51% of Americans say they're satisfied with national attitudes toward gay and lesbian people, a drop of several percentage points over the last couple of years and 11 points lower than 2022's high of 62%.
While the annual survey measures levels of satisfaction or dissatisfaction, "it does not tell us why they are satisfied or dissatisfied," said Gallup's Justin McCarthy.
The results reflected differences along partisan lines: 55% of those who identify as or lean Republican said they were satisfied with current levels of acceptance of gay and lesbian people, compared to just 43% of those identifying as or leaning Democrat.
This year's overall figure is the lowest since 2013, when only 49% of Americans said they were satisfied with the country's acceptance of gay and lesbian people. Two and a half years later, the U.S. Supreme Court would declare same-sex marriage a fundamental right protected by the 14th Amendment.
Attacks on the LGBTQ community have soared in recent years, with lawmakers and rhetoric especially targeting the rights of transgender youth, prompting the nation's largest gay rights organization to declare a "state of emergency" in 2023. Last year, a Republican Missouri secretary of state candidate produced a since-deleted video on social media telling Americans not to be "weak and gay."
Gallup's annual survey asks respondents to indicate how they feel about the state of the nation on a number of issues, such as crime, abortion and race relations. This year's survey, conducted by telephone, randomly sampled 1,005 adults in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Overall, the results indicated that while Americans' average satisfaction across 31 aspects of U.S. society or policy remains at record lows dating back to 2001, acceptance of gay and lesbian people is among a handful of measures with which a majority of Americans do express satisfaction.
Majorities of Americans also said they felt satisfied with the nation's military strength (63%), overall quality of life (62%), the state of women in the nation (59%) and the opportunity to get ahead through hard work (53%).
Americans were least satisfied with the amount they pay in federal taxes (26%), the size and influence of major corporations (25%), the quality of public education (24%), the nation's moral and ethical climate (22%) and efforts to confront poverty and homelessness (16%).
Fewer than four Americans said they were satisfied with acceptance of transgender people, the survey found: 38% of respondents expressed satisfaction and 50% said they were dissatisfied. Those numbers were slightly higher than in 2024, when Gallup first began asking the question.
Among respondents who identify as or lean Republican, 42% said they were satisfied, compared to 31% of those identify as or lean Democrat.
Overall satisfaction with the direction of the country remains historically low at 20% but higher than the 11% of January 2021, when Americans' mood reflected public discontent over the COVID-19 pandemic and the negative climate following the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
Americans collectively are less satisfied with most issues now than they were in January 2017, before Trump's first presidential term. The average rate of satisfaction with the measures posed in Gallup's survey sits at 38%, compared to 44% eight years ago, the organization said.
'Trump assumes office at a time of persistently low satisfaction with the U.S. overall and with many specific aspects of the country, which is consistent with Americans' belief that the U.S. lost more ground than it gained during Biden's presidency,' the Gallup report said.
However, the report notes that Americans also felt the same about Trump's first presidency. The president's initial job approval rating of 47% approval ranks among the lowest since 1953 – but higher than the 45% he garnered in 2017.