Corporate support for Pride dries up

Nearly a quarter of major corporate sponsors withdrew from this year’s pride events, including Mastercard, Nissan and Garnier – indicating a stark departure from last year’s rainbow-washing trends. 

At the heart of New York’s LGBTQIA+ community, these retreats feel disheartening – leaving people feeling both betrayed and anxious for their future. From nonprofit funding cuts through dashed diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives to pointed attacks against the transgender community, the queer community has weathered a grueling year, punctuated by sweeping corporate and institutional pullbacks of public support. 

For Stacy Lentz, co-founder and CEO of the Stonewall Inn Gives Back Initiative, the nonprofit behind New York’s historic LGBTQIA+ landmark – this year’s pride festivities felt heavy, harkening back to threats the community faced in its early history. 

“It feels heavy and weary,” Lentz told New York Nonprofit Media. “Maybe it's going back to the roots of what it was, where it's not a ton of just corporate folks, but we're marching and we're fighting and we're protesting and we're demanding, like the folks did at Stonewall in 1969.” 

As the official charitable arm of the Stonewall Inn, SIGBI primarily sustains itself through its wide array of corporate donors like JetBlue, AEG Worldwide, Jägermeister and Brooklyn Brewery –  the latter which recently awarded nearly $25,000 to direct aid for trans New Yorkers. With the funding it receives, the nonprofit distributes grants to grassroots LGBTQIA+ organizations, while its “Safe Spaces” Certification process helps identify businesses who are trained allies of the queer community. 

“What we try to do at SIGBI is work with the corporations through our Safe Spaces program – to have people really show authentic partnership and authentic allyship with the LGBTQ plus community,” said Lentz. “It’s just really daunting when you start to see folks leave when we need them the most.” 

Last year, major corporations leaned into the LGBTQIA+ community’s $1.4 trillion purchasing power, with mainstream outlets allocating more resources to targeted ads. According to a 2024 acceptance survey by GLAAD, the world’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer media advocacy organization – the vast majority of the U.S. population displayed support and acceptance towards the LGBTQIA community. These numbers appear to hold steady in this year’s report, as three in five non-LGBTQIA adults support the community – with Gen Z leading the charge. 

“It's interesting. I would say we've made a ton of progress with Gen Z, especially with Tiktok, Instagram, snap,” said Lentz. “But it’s interesting, there's another study out there that Gen Z, especially young men, are not as LGBTQ friendly. They’re definitely leaning a little more right than in previous decades of young men.” 

Despite Gen-Z showing greater literacy in LGBTQIA+ issues, more young men identified as Republican compared to young women last year – growing to a 9% point spread from 4% in 2013. These factors appear to amplify the impact of anti-transgender legislation: from threats to gender-affirming care, bans on professional and collegiate sports, “shield laws” and more. 

For advocates of the trans community, threats to gender-affirming care have been costly, resulting in families traveling across state lines to access care, and in some extreme circumstances, with clinics facing increased harassment and violence. Recently, all Medicaid coverage for transitional care was cut across the country, limiting access to care for an estimated 180,000 trans adults. 

“I don't want to mince words here: stripping trans youth of their gender affirming care is a death sentence,” said Angelica Christina, transgender activist and SIGBI Board Director in an interview with Teen Vogue. “Gender-affirming care is lifesaving, and I can personally speak to that experience.” 

From cuts to suicide hot lines, and mental health resources for LGBTQIA+ youth, nonprofits nationwide are trimming down their programming. With the trans community experiencing some of highest rates of mental illness, advocates worry that a lack of access to direct aid may exacerbate suicide rates and violence against the community. 

“When someone's trying to erase your existence, suicide rates will rise,” said Lentz. “You also could see murder rates rise against especially trans women of color, who also already get murdered at our alarming rate here in the U.S.” 

As of 2023, 35 transgender or gender-expansive people were killed, according to a report by Everytown for Gun Safety. These attacks have cast a heaviness on the queer community – with pride festivities appearing more modest compared to previous years. 

“I think everyone's kind of exhausted and tired of fighting for the bare minimum, especially trans and non-binary folks when they're just out there trying to exist,” said Lentz. “They're going to fight and fight back. But they may not feel like being so joyful around pride season this year.” 

For now, SIGBI is focused on using their platform to bolster grassroots organizations and allocate corporate funding. Yet, Lentz cautions that nonprofits should start getting used to working with tighter shoestring budgets.

“We've had to reject society and the fear of losing jobs and family and everything else. So we've always been fighters, just to be able to live our lives authentically,” said Lentz. “We may have a stonewall 2.0 type scenario if they keep rolling back our rights.”