Roger-Luc Chayer (Image : Pixabay)
A growing movement is currently emerging in the United States. It is mainly driven by left-wing community groups who accuse a far-right fringe within American LGBTQ+ communities of having contributed to Donald Trump’s election. Some even go so far as to claim that these people facilitated the rise to power of an authoritarian leader, deeply anti-LGBTQ+, who wishes to annihilate them worldwide.
How a few marginal supporters are turned into a massive political weapon by the media and influencers.
The rumor that LGBTQ+ communities, especially those from cultural minorities, helped favor Donald Trump’s re-election in 2024 is based more on political and ideological construction than on facts. This idea mainly circulates in certain conservative circles seeking to divide the progressive electorate by exploiting tensions around gender identity, sexual orientation, and cultural diversity.
Trump’s campaign actively fueled this climate by spreading provocative and polarizing messages, such as the “They/Them” advertisement, which linked transgender demands to controversial issues like immigration. This type of communication aimed to create an emotional reaction and deepen cultural divides, while suggesting that some LGBTQ+ populations (notably young people or people of color) had become too radical for the average voter, including other members of the LGBTQ+ community.
At the same time, conservative commentators and groups like the Log Cabin Republicans or Gays for Trump amplified the narrative that “normal gays” or moderate LGBTQ+ minorities were breaking away from current progressive movements. By highlighting a few atypical figures or individuals disagreeing with identity politics, these stories attempt to make people believe in a broader realignment, even a betrayal by the concerned communities.
Gays for Trump are a bit like a Céline Dion fan club… at a metal festival. They exist, they make noise, they have their booth, but they are not exactly representative of the crowd. They are mostly gay men, often white, who feel closer to Trump’s values than those of major LGBTQ+ organizations like GLAAD, which they accuse of trading “common sense” battles for an agenda too “woke” for their taste.
They like Trump because, to them, he embodies freedom, masculinity, order (and maybe a bit of chaos too, but never mind), and mostly because he hates the same things they do: progressive elites, loud activists, complicated pronouns, drag queens in the library… In short, everything that, in their view, has turned the LGBTQ+ community into a cultural battlefield.
They are the village rebels, those who go against the current with a MAGA flag flying behind their rainbow Jeep. They like to shock, shake things up, provoke, and see themselves as the right-wing punks of the LGBTQ+ movement. In reality, they are a very small but visible fraction on Twitter (sorry, X), yet largely marginal at the polls. In 2024, while 86% of LGBTQ+ voters cast their ballots for Kamala Harris, these few waved their “Trump is my daddy” signs shouting about Marxist conspiracies in CrossFit gyms.
At heart, Gays for Trump is mostly a political performance, a snub to the left, a convenient showcase for the Trump team to say: “Look, even gays like me!” Whereas, well… not really.
So, where does the rumor that LGBTQ+ people are responsible for Trump’s election come from?
The rumor that LGBTQ+ communities, especially those from cultural minorities, helped elect Donald Trump in 2024 is a bit like blaming vegetarians for a beef shortage: absurd, but it makes a catchy slogan for those looking for a scapegoat.
This idea was mainly fueled by the very tense and polarizing atmosphere of the election campaign. Trump’s team fully played the identity fear card, with provocative messages targeting transgender and non-binary people. Remember the infamous “They/Them” ad which, with a typically Trumpian subtlety, linked gender identities to immigration issues, as if all this was part of a single conspiracy against America. The goal was clear: sow confusion, stir tensions, and divide voters.
In this climate, some conservative groups started spreading conspiracy theories as old as they are malicious, accusing LGBTQ+ people of all sorts of horrors, from “grooming” to pedophilia. The goal: to tarnish the community’s image and delegitimize any defense of its rights. And to top it off, a few isolated cases of pro-Trump LGBTQ+ people were blown out of proportion by certain media or influencers to suggest an ideological shift was underway, while the electoral reality tells a very different story.
In the end, this rumor is nothing more than smoke and mirrors, built with political provocations and dubious amalgams. It mainly serves to fuel a culture war where it’s easier to blame a minority for causing a problem than to analyze its real causes. An old political recipe, recycled for the age of social networks.
The reality on the ground
Looking at the results of the 2024 election, it is quite clear that LGBTQ+ voters didn’t hesitate much: they voted massively for Kamala Harris. About 86% supported her, against barely 12 or 13% for Trump. This is a remarkable jump compared to 2020, when Biden got around 64% of the LGBTQ+ vote, while Trump scraped just over a quarter.
And if we zoom in, it’s even more striking among LGBTQ+ people of color, whose support for Harris nearly reached 91%. In other words, far from having contributed to Trump’s victory, these voters were among the most loyal to the Democratic camp. So if anyone is looking for a culprit to explain Trump’s resurgence, it definitely isn’t on the rainbow side.
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