US sees more than 350 anti-LGBTQ incidents in less than a year: report

More than 350 anti-LGBTQ incidents occurred in the United States in less than a year, a report found.

According to the report, released Thursday by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the LGBTQ rights group GLAAD, there were at least 356 anti-LGBTQ extremist and nonextremist incidents between June 2022 and April 2023 across 46 states. The report noted that Washington, D.C., California, Florida, New York and Texas had the highest total number of incidents.

“From demonstrations aiming to intimidate organizers and attendees at drag shows, to bomb threats against hospitals that offer health care for LGBTQ+ people to a mass shooting that took the lives of five people in Colorado, incidents of anti-LGBTQ+ hate and extremism are an important part of a larger story about the heightened threats facing the LGBTQ+ community in the United States today,” the report’s introduction stated.

The attacks covered in the report included 305 incidents of harassment, 40 incidents of vandalism and 11 incidents of assault. Nearly half of the incidents were associated with extremist groups. The total number of assaults, which included the deadly mass shooting at a club in Colorado that killed five people, also resulted in 31 injuries.

The largest spike in anti-LGBTQ incidents was recorded in June 2022, which could be connected to Pride month activities, the report noted. That month, 48 incidents were recorded, including 43 incidents of harassment, three incidents of vandalism and two assaults.

The target type of incidents was also recorded, with 138 incidents being related to drag events, 33 to schools and educators and 23 to health care. The report noted that anti-LGBTQ sentiment often overlapped with tropes and conspiracy theories about the community, including falsely associating it with grooming or satanism, or with other forms of prejudice such as racism and antisemitism.

The report noted that it did not include the total amount of anti-LGBTQ content online or record anti-LGBTQ legislation as incidents.