The rainbow flag still flies, even as the storm rages.

Remembering and resisting this Pride month.

Official White House photograph by Lawrence Jackson

As rainbow flags wave across the world this month, I keep thinking about what Pride Month meant to me last year—and how different it feels today. On June 10, 2024, Vice President Kamala Harris, my boss, officiated my wedding. No press, no fanfare, just an intimate ceremony in her Ceremonial Office to commemorate the anniversary of when she officiated some of the nation’s first same-sex marriages just 20 years ago. I said my vows to Kathleen: "I vow to start your days with black coffee and end them with a foot massage…. I vow to be the Marty to your Ruth, the Doug to your Kamala.…”

And there was Harris herself, beaming as she shut her binder, announcing, “I don’t need these notes,” and officiating our ceremony from the heart. She shared wisdom and guidance on family, love, and commitment. Then, she declared us "spouses for life." In Harris, I saw what true allyship looks like—in a marriage, in a movement, in a life committed to lifting others up rather than tearing them down.

As Harris’s videographer, I observed her allyship up close. She didn’t sport that iconic sequin jacket, become the first sitting vice president to march in a Pride parade, host rainbow-studded Pride receptions with the winners of RuPaul’s Drag Race at her residence, or visit Stonewall for the cameras or the clicks. She celebrates and stands up for our community because she believes deeply in equality. Now, while celebrating a muted World Pride in Washington, D.C., amid the systematic dismantling of LGBTQIA+ rights across our country, I can't stop thinking about what we had—and what we've lost.

Devastation from Day One

On his first day back in office, President Trump unleashed a violent assault on LGBTQIA+ Americans: his administration officially defined only male and female as "immutable biological classifications," effectively erasing transgender, intersex, and nonbinary people from federal recognition. Every federal agency has been ordered to "remove all statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications, or other internal and external messages that promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology."

The human cost has been staggering. Healthcare facilities are under threat, HIV programs have been canceled, and community health centers have paused programs for trans folks. The FBI has requested tips about hospitals and clinics providing gender-affirming surgeries to youth—a similar approach to abortion care and a chilling echo of authoritarian tactics that puts healthcare providers and families under government surveillance.

This isn't about policy or religion or culture. It's about persecution.

What True Allyship Looks Like

The contrast with what we had under the Biden-Harris administration and what we could have had under a Harris-Walz administration couldn't be more devastating. I spent every day for nearly three years watching Harris through my camera lens, documenting her interactions with world leaders, activists, and ordinary Americans. I saw her allyship up close and in quiet moments when no one was watching.

In February 2004, as the newly elected San Francisco District Attorney, Harris joined then-Mayor Gavin Newsom in officiating same-sex marriages at city hall during the "Winter of Love." In her memoir, “The Truths We Hold,” she recounted how city hall was "filled with people of every race, every color … wrapped around a whole city block" and she performed wedding ceremonies "in every nook and cranny.”

When we were in Ghana, Harris did a joint press conference with President Nana Akufo Addo. Zolan Kanno-Youngs of the New York Times asked about a proposed Ghanian bill that would imprison people for same-sex intercourse. The room went quiet; the air grew tense. I remember holding my frame steady on both leaders, so you could see both reactions.

“I’ll start.” Harris didn’t skip a beat. “I have raised this issue, and let me be clear about where we stand. First of all, for the American press who are here, you know that a great deal of work in my career has been to address human rights issues, equality issues across the board, including as it relates to the LGBTQ+ community. And I feel very strongly about the importance of supporting freedom and supporting and fighting for equality among all people, and that all people be treated equally. I will also say that this is an issue that we consider, and I consider, to be a human rights issue and that will not change.”

As Nii-Quartelai Quartey, who was in the room, wrote for LGBTQ Nation, “It would’ve been easy for Vice President Harris to duck the question.… But she took a stand anyway.”

Her record is impressive on paper. She was among the first politicians to support marriage equality as an elected official in California, and she had a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign Congressional Scorecard as a U.S. senator. But it’s more than just what was on paper. As San Francisco district attorney, she established one of the nation's first LGBTQ+-focused hate crimes units and spearheaded training for prosecutors to reject the "gay panic" defense. Later, as California attorney general, she refused to defend Proposition 8, the state's ban on same-sex marriage, and petitioned the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to strike it down.

Under the Biden-Harris administration, we saw what the most pro-equality administration in history could accomplish: the Respect for Marriage Act protecting same-sex and interracial marriages.

Cruelty in the tactics, cruelty in the timing

What makes this Pride Month particularly cruel is the onslaught of attacks our community has experienced since Jan. 20. Trump has erased intersex and transgender people from federal recognition, ordered an end to DEI programs, banned pride flags from federal buildings, prohibited self-identification through gender pronouns, banned transgender people from serving in the military, and slashed funding for LGBTQIA+ health research and gender affirming care.

The administration has introduced the loaded term "gender ideology" into official government discourse, defining it to include "the idea that there is a vast spectrum of genders that are disconnected from one's sex." This is a dangerous attempt to delegitimize the very existence of transgender Americans, to write our trans siblings out of the official record. Their existence has always been a revolution and a blessing.

In the days leading up to Pride Month and DC WorldPride—what should be our moment of solidarity, community, and celebration—the U.S. Park Police said they would block off a park in a queer DC neighborhood, the FBI solicited tips on medical providers offering gender-affirming care, and Trump threatened to cut funds to California over transgender athletes. On June 3, as I was filming a documentary at DC WorldPride about the LGBTQIA+ movement, I received a news alert on my phone that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the Navy to rename a ship honoring murdered gay rights pioneer Harvey Milk.

And this week, the Supreme Court delivered another devastating blow to our community. In a 6-3 decision, the justices upheld Tennessee's law banning all gender-affirming care for minors—a ruling that affects the more than 100,000 trans youth living in the 25 states with similar bans. The court decided that politicians and judges, not doctors and families, should make deeply personal medical decisions about treatments that major medical associations have endorsed as safe and necessary. For trans teenagers like L.W., who brought the Tennessee case, losing access to this care feels like “real-life body horror”—the terrifying loss of autonomy over your own body. But this cruelty isn't just an attack on trans youth; it's an attack on all of us. The same forces that seek to erase trans children today will come for the rest of us tomorrow.

This Pride Month, We Remember and We Resist

For every bigoted executive order, there are lawsuits challenging them, with some courts issuing temporary restraining orders to halt the most egregious policies. The legal system remains one crucial bulwark against this assault on our rights. But litigation alone isn't enough.

As we mark Pride Month 2025, we're not just celebrating how far we've come—we're mourning how much we've lost, and we’re preparing for the fight ahead. We had genuine federal leadership committed to protecting LGBTQIA+ Americans. We had allies who understood that our rights aren't negotiable. We had a vice president who married same-sex couples 20 years ago because it was right and because she believed in their love—and who married my wife and me last year for the same reason.

That's what we're fighting to get back: not just policy positions or political calculations, but leaders who see us as fully human, deserving of dignity and respect.

The rainbow flag still flies, even as the storm rages. In quiet ceremonies and loud protests, in courtrooms and voting booths, we keep showing up—because that's what Pride means. The courage to be visible, to be proud, to be ourselves.

As I remember my wedding day, I remember thinking about all the couples who came before us, all the people who couldn't have this moment, the ones who fought so we could. Twenty years earlier, Kamala Harris stood in San Francisco City Hall officiating queer weddings knowing their marriages might be legally invalidated. Knowing it was the right thing to do anyway.

I remember how Harris smiled as she proclaimed us a family and threw in a “Mazel tov!” for good measure. I remember her joy for us, her delight in gifting us the pen that she’d used to sign our marriage certificate. I remember feeling deeply blessed to have the chance to be married as I feared for my queer community in countries where marriage is illegal.

A year later, I fear for us here in the United States.

Azza Cohen (she/her) is an award-winning documentary filmmaker who served as Vice President Kamala Harris's official videographer in the White House. She recently founded a production company with her wife, Kathleen, and is writing a book about visual sexism from a cinematographer's perspective. Uncover and address visual sexism alongside Azza every other week here on The Contrarian and on Instagram and Bluesky.

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