Politics

Three trans people banned from White House events after going topless at Joe Biden’s Pride party

Attendees start to gather on the South Lawn for the White House Pride Month celebration
Attendees start to gather on the South Lawn for the White House Pride Month celebration Photo: Jerame Davis

Three guests from this past Saturday’s White House Pride party have been banned from future White House events after they shared pictures of themselves topless at the event.

“It was unfair to the hundreds of attendees who were there to celebrate their families,” said out White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. “This behavior is inappropriate and disrespectful for any event at the White House. It is not reflective of the event we hosted to celebrate LGBTQI+ families or the other hundreds of guests who were in attendance.”

“Individuals in the video will not be invited to future events.”

One of the people in the group who went topless was trans influencer Rose Montoya. She posted a short video of her with two trans men from the event. She was holding her hands over her breasts next to the two trans men, who were shirtless.

“Are we topless at the White House?” someone asked in the video.

The video got attention on rightwing media, where a cropped image showing only Montoya topless was shared on social media to make it appear like she was the only one going topless at the White House.

“The perversity is the feature, not the bug, of radical gender ideology,” Daily Wire editor Ben Shapiro wrote after sharing the cropped image of just Montoya and saying that he doesn’t believe that the White House has actually banned her from future events. It is unclear why he doesn’t believe the White House.

“Stop pretending that this sort of behavior is somehow extraneous to the central conceit,” he continued. “This has been the lie for two generations: ‘all we want is the right to visit our partners in the hospital!’ And the deliverable is the radical overthrow of all traditional norms and the celebration of perversity.”

But Montoya explained that the whole situation was much more banal than what Shapiro suggested.

“My trans masculine friends were showing off their top surgery scars and living in joy, and I wanted to join them,” she said in a later TikTok video. “And because it is perfectly within the law of Washington D.C., I decided to join them and cover my nipples just to play it safe.”

“I was simply living my joy and my truth and existing in my body,” she said in the video captioned “free the nipple #trans.” She also said that the rightwing freak out over her chest shows that they see her as a woman.

Don't forget to share:

Support vital LGBTQ+ journalism

Reader contributions help keep LGBTQ Nation free, so that queer people get the news they need, with stories that mainstream media often leaves out. Can you contribute today?

Cancel anytime · Proudly LGBTQ+ owned and operated

Emblems of equality: Discovering the world of LGBTQ+ Pride flags

Previous article

Ron DeSantis won’t even talk to Pete Buttigieg about Florida’s transportation projects

Next article