Corporate America has fallen out of love with Pride month – and it’s because of Donald Trump.
Businesses that used to smother their merchandise in rainbow flags for the month of June have dramatically scaled back this year, many wary of provoking an investigation by the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, Pride events across the US are facing budget shortfalls as corporate sponsors duck out.
Robby Starbuck, the anti-woke activist known for his pressure campaigns, believes a “massive” shift has taken place at some of the world’s biggest companies in the past year.
Polling of 200 corporate executives by Gravity Research, seen by The Telegraph, showed almost two in five plan to pare back their Pride month celebrations this year.
Of those, the overwhelming majority – 60 per cent – said this was a result of pressure by Mr. Trump.
“It’s clear that the administration and their supporters are driving the change,” Luke Hartig, president of Gravity Research, said. “Companies are under increasing pressure not to engage and speak out on issues.”
On his first days in office, Mr. Trump issued a flurry of executive orders taking aim at diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in both the government and private sector.
Jeremy Tedesco, a senior counsel with the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), believes that most companies regard Pride as a “performative act” and are now unwilling to risk incurring the wrath of the administration by showing their support.
“In those orders are promises to use the department of justice and some of the other relevant federal agencies to investigate recalcitrant companies that are continuing illegal practices,” he said.
“Companies are viewing this as a legitimate risk at this point.”
Right-wing activists believe much of corporate America’s commitment to Pride month and LGBT causes is underpinned by the Human Rights Campaign, an influential pressure group.
Eric Bloem, its vice-president of corporate citizenship, claimed Mr. Trump was “weaponizing” the justice department and the equal employment opportunity commission to “intimidate companies”.
“Companies that show up only when it’s convenient, or backtrack the moment there’s political pressure, risk losing trust and credibility,” he told CNN.
Americans cynical about companies embracing Pride
Gravity’s polling shows Americans are broadly cynical about companies that have embraced Pride, believing they are more concerned with profit than principle.
“It’s primarily that Left-wing activists figured out the levers of pressure to apply to companies, to get them to do what they wanted to do, while the Right of centre didn’t really show up,” Mr. Tedesco said.
Now it is the Left which appears to have been caught flat-footed by the sudden shift in the political landscape.
In San Francisco, the US’ longstanding liberal bastion, its annual Pride event reportedly faces a $200,000 budget gap after corporate donors failed to materialize this year.
Heritage of Pride, the group behind celebrations in New York and other American cities, is attempting to claw its way out of a budget shortfall of some $750,000 for the same reason.
Anheuser-Busch, a company scarred by its corporate partnership with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney, has left Pridefest in St Louis, Missouri $150,000 in the black after ending its three-decade sponsorship.
Washington DC is hosting World Pride this year, meaning drag queens and demonstrators waving rainbow flags will soon be descending on Mr. Trump’s doorstep.
But there too, Booz Allen Hamilton, the technology company, withdrew its sponsorship citing its need to comply with “recently issued executive orders”, according to the Washington Business Journal.
The Kennedy Centre, the performing arts venue where Mr. Trump installed himself as chairman soon after taking office this year, has also cancelled its “Tapestry of Pride” events which were scheduled to last from June 5 to 8.
Washington Pride Alliance subsequently distanced itself from the centre, labelling the move “disappointing”.
Threat of backlash
Gravity’s polling shows 39 per cent of companies said they were toning down their celebrations because of a threat of a backlash from the Right.
Just seven per cent said they had been swayed by resistance from progressives, in a sign of the shifting power dynamics in American politics.
Mr. Starbuck, one of America’s most vocal anti-DEI campaigners, said companies had belatedly realized they were going to “divide their customer base” by leaning too heavily into Pride events.
The political clash over Pride and DEI causes has created an untenable situation for companies, he told The Telegraph.
“You’re going to elicit this yearly outrage where you’re a ping pong ball in the culture war,” Mr. Starbuck said.
“I think that when they talk to one side and they talk to the other side, what they find is we’re the rational ones. I’m not demanding that they take on my politics – I’m asking for corporate neutrality. The other side is demanding total adherence to their ideology.
“The left is losing ground because they’re behaving absurdly and they expect companies to be a proxy for their beliefs, whereas I expect companies just to stay out of divisive subjects.”
