On March 4, for the second time since the start of the 2025 state legislative session, over 200 hundred LGBTQ Georgians and their allies descended on the State Capitol in downtown Atlanta as at least seven anti-LGBTQ bills inched closer to becoming law.
“Pride to the Capitol” included more than a dozen LGBTQ equality groups from across the state along with the Human Rights Campaign to help everyday citizens mobilize their messages and meet with lawmakers to share their stories. The event wrapped with a rally at Liberty Plaza and a press conference inside the Capitol. The day-long action arrived just before Crossover Day on March 6, which marks the deadline for bills to pass in at least one chamber to have a chance of becoming law.
“Pride to the Capitol” served as a direct response to what advocates described as a “tsunami of anti-trans hate” from Georgia lawmakers who made restricting the civil rights of transgender Georgians a day-one legislative priority.
“This is not a time to sit on our hands,” said DeMarcus Beckham, Macon-based Regional Organizer for HRC and rally host. “We need people who are willing to confront those bullies across the street [inside the State Capitol]. We don’t need any more allies; we need accomplices.”
The stakes couldn’t have been more precise for Danieelle, a transgender woman at the rally who requested to only be identified by her first name out of fear for her safety. She tells GLAAD she is often overwhelmed by the level of hatred directed at the transgender community by elected officials.
“It’s really depressing that it’s 2025, and this is still where we are,” Danieelle said. “To have it directed at you personally is really scary. You want to think about leaving the country, but then you also want to stick up for people you know who can’t stand up for themselves,” she said.
“Whether it is intentional or just complete ignorance, they should understand that they represent us—Georgians,” Beckham said as he looked out into the crowd with signs that read “Equality Now” and “Human.”
As the rally commenced, so did the advancement of SB 36, a bill proponents say is necessary to protect religious rights, while LGBTQ advocates warned it would be a license to use religious belief to discriminate against LGBTQ people and other marginalized groups. The bill passed along party lines in a 32-23 vote in the Senate on Tuesday as LGBTQ advocates inside and outside the Capitol appealed to lawmakers to resist curtailing LGBTQ progress.
Out legislator, Sen. RaShaun Kemp (D-South Fulton), told The AJC that Georgians already have religious freedom. The only thing the “bill does is use their religion as a free pass to discriminate.”
“When I go to church with my husband and my two kids, I get to worship and praise God with no limitations, and you can actually do the same,” he said.
“We’ve seen this political playbook before,” Rep. Sam Park (D-107) said inside the statehouse during the press conference. Park is also an out Georgia legislator.
“When politicians fail to address the real challenges that Georgians face, like the skyrocketing cost of living, a broken healthcare system, and a need for better economic opportunities, they look for scapegoats instead of doing the work to solve real problems affecting every Georgian.”
A resilient community
Transgender advocate, rally speaker, and history-making Miss Georgia contestant Bella Bautista defiantly echoed the sentiments of Park, Kemp, and hundreds of LGBTQ people inside Liberty Plaza.
“They want us to believe that being our authentic self is too much; too controversial, too political,” Bautista said. “But here’s the truth: I am not a controversy. I am not a debate. I am living proof that we belong. They may try to silence us, but you cannot silence a movement.”
“There have been moments where I questioned my place in a world that has often tried to erase us; erase Black men, erase Black trans men, men like me,” said Dr. Elijah Nicholas, founder and executive director of The Global Trans Equity Project and a rally speaker.
“For every single step I’ve taken—every moment of doubt—every triumph has taught me one thing: I am here. I am worthy. And I am not invisible,” Nicholas said.
For James Waldrop, 80, being present and visible at the rally held a significant meaning as a queer man who came of age and into the awareness of his sexual orientation and gender identity during the Silent Generation. Waldrop tells GLAAD that for 70 years, he has lived a “feminine life inside a male body.”
“I am who I am, no matter what I look like. And that’s why I say my sexual orientation is not a threat to anyone. And anyone’s sexual orientation should not be a threat to any other,” Waldrop said.
Waldrop says the current political climate has forced him out of his comfort zone.
“I’ve been pushed to the point that I can no longer sit and not participate,” he said. “I want to be heard, so the only way to be heard is to be out and present, and that’s what I want to be.”
The same is true for Aeden Rowell, 22, a transgender man and Duluth, GA resident who shared his story during the press conference of being raised in conservative Jackson County, GA, in a religious family who were members of the same Episcopal church as Gov. Brian Kemp.
“I played the role that was expected of me, but like any performance that lasts too long, it drained me,” Rowell said.
“My religious community support gave me the strength to get me through a difficult time in my life. But that support alone could not change the way I saw myself in the mirror. I needed medical care, life-saving care, gender-affirming care, so when I looked at my reflection, I saw the person who I knew I always was,” he added.
Rowell had one question for lawmakers inside the Capitol working to convince their colleagues and Georgians that his existence as a transgender person poses a threat.
“I ask you this: think about someone in your life who you love. If they came out to you as transgender, how would you react?” We are your friends. We are your neighbors. We are your children. We sit beside you in church pews, in classrooms, in communities with you across this state. We are not a threat, but right now, our lives are under threat,”Rowell said.
Still, according to Jeff Graham, executive director of Georgia Equality, there is reason for hope.
“Change happens all the time. And change will happen for the transgender community here in Georgia as well,” Graham said.
“We are fighting laws that want to take us backward. The challenges are real, but we’ve survived it all before. We are the most resilient community imaginable. We will make sure that people have access to medical care. We will make sure that our young people have the support they need,” he added. “And we will eventually win these laws in Georgia and find a day when they stop coming after us.”