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Alysse Dalessandro for The Advocate:

Driving along historic Route 66 in Edwardsville, Illinois, I heard the honking before I saw the crowd. At first, all I could make out were American flags waving in the town square. As a solo queer female traveler passing through a city of about 26,000 people, I kept my guard up. Then I spotted a sign. "Proud LGBTQ Mom, Proud Ally." Other signs called for protecting democracy and fighting fascism. I had reached Edwardsville roughly 275 miles into a monthlong journey along Route 66. From June 7 through July 1, I’m exploring the LGBTQ+ experience along America's most famous highway — its past, present, and future.

As Route 66 celebrates its centennial this year, communities across its more than 2,400 miles are marking the occasion with festivals, museum exhibits, and tributes to the roadway's place in American history. But after visiting Route 66 landmarks and museums, I kept noticing who was missing from the story. Some sites acknowledge the barriers Black travelers faced and the safe havens that emerged in response, including places such as the Alberta Hotel in Springfield, Missouri. LGBTQ+ travelers, however, are largely absent from the official narrative. Yet their stories are everywhere once you start looking.

The horns continued to sound as I met Andi Smith, who explained that the American flags were part of preparations for Edwardsville's upcoming Route 66 centennial celebration. Smith knows the town square well. She has been standing there every Friday at noon since Feb. 4, 2025. What started as one woman's frustration with the current administration has grown into a community catalyst. Smith said anywhere from 100 to 300 people now attend the weekly demonstrations, while as many as 1,600 joined the community's recent No Kings protest.

"The first day I stood here by myself, and someone joined me wearing a rainbow sweatshirt," Smith said. "And the next day we had five. By Friday we had a dozen, and it's just kept steamrolling every single week since then." In an April 2025 speech, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker applauded Smith's efforts and the stand she has taken in her community. I had never heard of Edwardsville before planning this trip. Yet just a few hours after meeting Smith in the town square, I found myself examining archival documents of LGBTQ+ history when Edwardsville unexpectedly appeared again.

An arrest record in the archives

Along a stretch of roadway designated Historic Route 66 in St. Louis, the Missouri Historical Society is home to the Gateway to Pride collection, one of the Midwest's largest repositories of LGBTQ+ history. The collection preserves everything from personal letters and photographs to police records and organizational documents. Sitting in the archives and paging through materials spanning decades of queer life, I came across a document from the St. Louis Department of Police dated August 27, 1954. The complaint alleged, "homosexuals frequenting the above mentioned taverns." While the names and addresses of those arrested had been redacted, their hometowns remained. Among them was a 28-year-old shipping clerk from Edwardsville. We don't know how he arrived at that St. Louis gay bar. But given the geography and the era, it's entirely possible he traveled there on Route 66. That possibility lingered with me. Because while Route 66 is often remembered as a symbol of freedom, reinvention, and opportunity, it may also have served another purpose: helping LGBTQ+ people find one another. [...]

The journey isn't over

The secrecy that shaped so much of LGBTQ+ history may feel distant. But in many ways, it isn't. Recent years have brought a wave of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and policies that have complicated daily life — and travel — for many people, particularly transgender Americans. In Kansas, for example, the Department of Revenue began sending letters earlier this year invalidating driver's licenses that reflected transgender residents' gender identities. The policy became one more reminder that where a person lives — or travels — can still shape how safely they move through the world. Along Route 66, however, I kept finding communities working to fill those gaps. Illinois' reputation as an LGBTQ+-affirming state has made places like Edwardsville and Springfield destinations for people seeking safety, support, and stability.

"Our governor has really done a good job of making sure the entire country knows that we are an open and affirming state," said Teresa Silva, executive director of the Phoenix Center in Springfield, Illinois. As a result, she said, people are relocating. "People are flooding to this area from states all around us," Silva said. "We have several transplants that are part of the Phoenix Center community from outside that have come to this area because they can't receive gender affirming care or because they're scared to lose their kids or their marriage." I never expected to find a thriving LGBTQ+ community center providing housing support, HIV testing, harm reduction services, and other resources in Springfield. But Springfield wasn't the only place where I found organizations filling critical gaps.

Molly Sprayregen (She/Her) at LGBTQ Nation:

Conservatives are up in arms over the fact that Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D) appointed a trans rights supporter to the state’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Board. Kellen MacBeth, the founder and president of LGBTQ+ advocacy group Equality Arlington, has “a long history of pushing gender transitions for minors,” according to right-wing outlet The Washington Free Beacon. Equality Arlington advocates for the rights of trans and nonbinary students and has spoken out against the Trump administration’s anti-trans policies. Macbeth also wrote a letter advocating for best practice gender-affirming care for trans youth.

This year, Equality Arlington also launched the Arlington Trans Youth Quilt Project, for which trans kids ages 5 through 19 created quilt squares to answer the question, “What does Freedom to Be mean to Me?” The group also advocates for discrimination policies that protect LGBTQ+ people, especially trans people.

The Free Beacon wrote that MacBeth’s appointment proves Spanberger’s “embrace of left-wing gender activism” and claimed it “contradicts the rhetoric Spanberger offered on the issue while campaigning as a ‘moderate’ Democrat.” The publication pointed to the fact that Spanberger said she believes the issue of trans kids in sports should be addressed by schools on a case-by-case basis, rather than relying on the state or federal governments to enact sweeping legislation.

Despite the Free Beacon’s view of Spanberger’s moderate campaign, her GOP opponent, Winsome Earle-Sears, repeatedly accused Spanberger of being obsessed with trans rights.  Earle-Sears ran multiple ads attacking Spanberger for her support of trans rights. One of the ads ended with a slogan reminiscent of the 2024 presidential campaign, saying that Spanberger is “for they/them, not for us.”  [...] Virginia’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Board consists of 26 members, including 21 nonlegislative citizen members, at least 15 of whom must identify as LGBTQ+. The current board contains several conservatives appointed by the virulently anti-LGBTQ+ former Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R).

The right-wing faux outrage machine had a fit over Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D)’s pick to fill a spot on the commonwealth’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Board: pro-trans rights supporter Kellen MacBeth.

See Also:

Jay Kuo at The Status Kuo:

On the morning of June 16, U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen—a Trump appointee confirmed on a party-line Senate vote—stood before cameras at the federal courthouse in Minneapolis to announce what his office called a sweeping conspiracy to undermine federal law enforcement. His office had obtained an eight-count felony indictment against 15 people connected to anti-ICE organizing in the Twin Cities. The lead charge was conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer. Rosen described the defendants as participants in a left-wing coalition called Direct Action Minnesota, which he accused of “surveillance, operational planning, and rapid mobilization against law enforcement actions.” Behind him, on a monitor, was the evidence he had chosen to lead with: a screenshot of a social media post. “You see here a Facebook post from one of the defendants writing, quote: ‘We need to become ungovernable. We need to resist any way we can to materially stop the Nazi occupation,’” Rosen read aloud. Twelve of the 15 defendants had already been arrested that morning. Two remained at large. Rosen closed with a warning: “If you are actively conspiring to impede law enforcement … you ought to assume that we’re watching you and that we will get you.” But the unusual charges have already led to many questions.

The thought police

Rosen had told MPR News reporter Matt Sepic that the people were “charged not for what they said but what they did.” But he led his presentation with a defendant’s thoughts posted publicly online. A defense attorney in attendance, Bruce Nestor, called the presser a “propaganda show” and zeroed in on this central contradiction. Then he asked what we were all thinking: “What’s wrong with being ungovernable by a fascist government?” Minnesota Reformer reporter Madison McVan noted that more than a third of the individuals charged during the earlier federal crackdown on Minnesota protesters had already had their cases dismissed or failed in some way. If that’s the case, why was this case different?

“I don’t think any cases have failed in any way,” Rosen replied. A second reporter immediately bodychecked him with facts. Prosecutors had in fact dropped 18 of the 36 prior cases entirely, with non-prosecution agreements in at least 11 more. Rosen was also asked directly whether any federal officers had actually been harmed. He declined to say. “Whether or not they actually at the end of the day caused bodily harm,” Rosen argued, “is not the measure of whether or not they committed a serious federal crime.”

Minneapolis in the spotlight again In Season Two, the federal government has chosen to put Minneapolis back in the news, so it’s helpful to review what happened in Season One. Operation Metro Surge launched in December 2025, flooding the Twin Cities and surrounding areas with federal immigration agents. At its peak, roughly 4,000 officers from ICE and Customs and Border Protection had been deployed across the state, ultimately making more than 3,700 arrests. Federal agents killed two U.S. citizens in incidents caught on camera—Renée Good on January 7, and Alex Pretti on January 24—bringing the number of people shot across the country between September 2025 and February 2026 to 13, with four fatalities. Residents of Minneapolis organized in response to the surge and the killings. Community members filmed federal agents during enforcement actions, a practice former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem characterized as a form of violence against officers. Hundreds, and eventually thousands, of Twin Cities residents joined community patrol networks, monitoring ICE movements and bearing witness to arrests.

[...]

The charges

The indictment unsealed Tuesday runs 94 pages. The bulk of it is devoted to a single charge applied to all 15 defendants: conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer under 18 U.S.C. § 372. The statute was first enacted in 1861, and the Justice Department’s own Office of Legal Counsel, in a 1977 memorandum, noted it had historically been charged only alongside substantive offenses like assault, and had rarely stood alone. It appeared most recently in a handful of January 6 prosecutions. Before that, its most notable use was against a pair of tax protesters who retreated to their New Hampshire home with a cache of weapons in 2007. The Justice Department is now applying it to nonviolent protest organizers in Minnesota. To establish the conspiracy, the indictment leans heavily on the group’s internal communications and organizational activity. These include

conducting Signal chats in which members expressed frustration with non-violent tactics;

holding planning sessions for blockades around the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building in Fort Snelling;

creating a GoFundMe account;

organizing training sessions for new members;

attending worker assemblies held at the United Labor Centre in Minneapolis, cited in the indictment as evidence of criminal coordination;

and holding an “Anarchist Speaking Tour” in Chicago, Ann Arbor, and Seattle in April, where members allegedly shared tactics with other groups.

And of course, that Facebook post. As Talking Points Memo noted, beyond the base conspiracy charge, some individual defendants face additional counts. Kyle Wagner, who had previously been arrested in February on federal threat and cyberstalking charges, faces counts of solicitation to commit a crime of violence and interstate threats, based on social media posts urging followers to abandon peaceful protest.

The Trump Regime’s DOJ conducting farcical politically-motivated prosecutions of 15 Minneapolis anti-ICE protesters is a fascistic insult to American values.

See Also:

Public Notice (Lisa Needham): Minnesota anti-ICE protesters get the Broadview 6 treatment

Alix Breeden at Daily Kos:

When Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer wrote “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” in 1908, they seemingly left out the lyrics about using America’s greatest pastime to promote Christianity. However, San Francisco Giants players didn’t forget to push their religion on Friday at the team’s annual Pride Night.  Pitchers Landen Roupp, J.T. Brubaker, and Ryan Walker all wrote Bible verse numbers on their caps next to the rainbow Giants logo. Another player decided to forgo wearing the rainbow at all. Roupp’s cap included Genesis 9:12-16, which speaks of when God created the rainbow, deeming it the symbol of his “everlasting covenant.” Now, interpret that as you will, but Roupp insisted that he was just trying to showcase his own faith. “It’s just about God’s covenant and a promise that he makes to us that, you know, his faithfulness and his mercy. … That’s just kind of something I believe in, and I stand firm in that, and I’m thankful we live in a country where, you know, we have the freedom to believe what we want … and express what we want,” he said during a postgame press conference. Sam Hentges, who chose to not wear the Pride cap at all, was a little more direct. 

“It’s just something that I feel like I was forced to support when I don’t morally support it,” he told reporters Saturday. “There wasn’t hatred behind it. I think that’s kind of something that’s misinterpreted. I don’t hate the LGBTQ community. It’s just something I believed and talked with teammates and family, and they supported it.” [...] While the players haven’t faced any fines yet, the MLB warned that any “future violations” would result in a hefty fine.  “The writing on the cap violates our rules, and consistent with normal practice, we have warned the players about future violations,” MLB Chief Communications Officer Pat Courtney said in a statement obtained by ESPN.

[...] This set off a firestorm of commentary from MAGA personalities including Vice President JD Vance, who tweeted, “Trump won we don’t have to do this anymore.” The controversy also caught the attention of Trump acolytes like actor Rob Schnieder.  “I will pay the fines for any @MLB Christian player who wears a Bible verse on their uniform,” he wrote on X, calling the MLB (in all caps, natch) “ANTI-CHRISTIAN.” Actor Kevin Sorbo joined in, tweeting, “Happy to chip in with you on this.” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott also chimed in to brag that the Texas Rangers don’t celebrate Pride Night, but instead promote a “faith and family night.” He tweeted that “In Texas, we don’t punish people for living out their faith. We protect that right.”  Unfortunately, Texas isn’t the only state erasing Pride month and related events. In Missouri, Sen. Josh Hawley accused the MLB of penalizing players for practicing their faith. In a publicly shared letter, Hawley accused the organization of “anti-Christian bigotry.”

Daniel Villarreal (he/him) at LGBTQ Nation:

Vice President J.D. Vance wrote a social media message seemingly supporting an Major League Baseball player who wrote a Bible verse on their baseball cap during a June 12 Pride Night event at the Oracle Park ballpark in San Francisco, California. The image that Vance commented on showed San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Laden Roupp, who wrote Gen 9:11-16, a Bible verse about the rainbow, on his black cap bearing his team’s logo in rainbow colors. The verse, which follows God’s promise to never again flood the world for its sinful ways, says, “I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the Earth.”

Sports Illustrated (SI) posted the image of Roupp and noted that he was one of three Giants players who wrote Bible verses on their Pride caps as well as that the MLB had issued a warning to the players. In response to SI‘s post, Vance wrote, “Trump won we don’t have to do this anymore.”

It’s unclear what exactly Vance thinks “we don’t have to do” anymore: hold baseball team Pride Nights, write Bible verses on ballcaps, or warn MLB players who break the league’s uniform rules by altering their apparel (as the MLB did in this case).

It’s most likely that Vance meant that sports teams don’t have to hold Pride Nights or have players wear Pride-themed gear. The current presidential administration has largely sought to eliminate all LGBTQ+ recognition in its crusade to end all diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, as well as its ongoing empowerment of anti-LGBTQ+ Christian conservatives. Despite Vance’s vague assertion, 29 out of 30 MLB teams are holding Pride Night events this year, Outsports reported; the only team not doing so is the Texas Rangers.

[...] Fox News recently accused MLB of launching an “attack on faith”, with contributor Mary Katharine Ham saying, “It’s not tolerant, and by the way, support for LGBTQ causes has been going precipitously down because of this behavior. It used to be a live and let live argument, which is something most Americans were very friendly to, and then it became ‘Bake the cake and wear the hat, you bigot.'” While Ham is correct that public and corporate support for LGBTQ+ causes has declined somewhat recently, the decline is largely due to federal, state, and local Republican attacks against companies and organizations that have LGBTQ+ inclusive DEI policies as well as right-wing campaigns targeting any groups that ally with the LGBTQ+ community.

Way to go, America!

Look what the world thinks you voted for, but did you? And even if you did, would you do so again? And even if you wouldn't, would he still be President?