This Pride season, Seattle isn’t just celebrating—it’s under siege. A roadshow of organized bigots has rolled into town, and if you think these anti-LGBTQ events are just local drama, think again. This is a national playbook—refined under Trump, reloaded for 2025.
These aren’t one-off stunts; they’re coordinated attacks. These provocateurs and bigoted actors are targeting inclusive cities like Seattle, hiding behind disingenuous claims of “free speech” and “religious liberty” to push an authoritarian agenda. But what really drives these events is baiting backlash, spinning resistance into persecution, and intimidating local leaders into silence—or goading them into missteps they can exploit.
We’ve seen this playbook before. During Trump’s first term, the Pacific Northwest became an extremist testing ground, with Portland at the center. In 2017, white nationalist networks stormed into the Rose City—armed, aggressive, and eager to provoke. Local officials were caught off guard. Responses were delayed and contradictory, which helped extremists fill the vacuum by manufacturing chaos and growing their influence. The result was years of anti-democracy rallies and violence that turned Portland into a national hub of authoritarian activity at a critical moment in the first Trump administration. Many other cities, including Seattle, had their own experiences with bad actors attempting to iterate on the same playbook; it often felt like our friends around the country looked to Portland as a portent of their future problems.
But through organizing and hard-earned lessons, Portland adapted. City leaders passed a resolution condemning white supremacy. Public agencies received trainings to identify and counter bigoted organizing. Community organizations like ours helped build new coordination between civil society and government to prevent political violence. When Portland anticipated another large-scale rally in 2019, the city responded in unified fashion, bringing elected officials, community leaders, and law enforcement together to denounce hate. Leaders had been bracing for violence, but instead the rally was smaller than projected, and it fizzled fast.
Still, this wasn’t a clean victory. Coordination was inconsistent, and earlier delays allowed anti-democracy groups to build power and test hateful tactics they would use elsewhere. Aggressive and unaccountable policing only undermined public trust and further inflamed tensions. The far-right media machine had already painted Portland as a symbol of liberal failure. That narrative only emboldened the extremist movement targeting the city. But Portland didn’t cave. Organizers continued to reject hate, and eventually, with a shift in law enforcement focus to violent anti-democracy actors, the rallies petered out.
Seattle now faces a similar inflection point.
Following the anti-LGBTQ events in May, more are already planned for August. Organizers are laying rhetorical traps, framing local opposition to bigotry as “religious discrimination”—a tactic we’ve seen succeed in the courts of public opinion and policy.
This isn’t just about Seattle or Pride. It’s part of a national strategy to undermine our cities’ inclusive values, provoke public backlash, and invoke a response from the Trump administration. Just look to Los Angeles as a recent example of a city that stepped up to defend its Latinx and immigrant communities only to watch Trump weaponize the National Guard against its residents.
And the stakes are rising. GLAAD’s 2024 tracker has already documented over 900 anti-LGBTQ incidents this year. These attacks are increasingly focused on inclusive communities, where hate groups aim to fracture trust between local leaders and residents. And with the Trump administration, we know this playbook will expand—as federal agencies become more openly weaponized against dissenting cities.
To be prepared, Seattle officials must lead by issuing a clear public message affirming that diverse communities are foundational to the city’s civic life. Leaders must plan proactively by uniting community organizers, safety coalitions, public agencies, and mutual aid networks. Seattle law enforcement needs plans to prioritize de-escalation, before more bad actors descend on the city aiming to destabilize trust in local government. Finally, city officials must clearly name the threat: we are being targeted by groups that want to build momentum for widespread authoritarianism and incite political violence.
Portland’s experience shows that when cities act with unity and purpose, provocateurs lose momentum. When we wait, consequences multiply—more disinformation, more intimidation, and more fear that our civic institutions will fold when tested.
Cities like Seattle are on the frontlines of a larger fight over who belongs in public, whose voices matter, and whether inclusive democracy can withstand coordinated pressure. The outcome here will signal what happens next—regionally and nationwide.
We know what’s coming. We’ve seen it before. Now is the time for Seattle leaders to act with courage and conviction.
Amy Herzfeld-Copple is the Executive Director at Western States Center, a national leader committed to building a thriving inclusive democracy in the West and beyond. For nearly 40 years, the organization has partnered with civic, faith, and community leaders across the Pacific Northwest and Mountain states—regions deeply impacted by authoritarianism and organized bigotry. Rooted in racial and gender justice, their work builds lasting power, strengthens cross-community solidarity, and supports local leaders and institutions to stand firm in the face of ongoing threats.
It wasn’t an attack in any legal sense. It was protected First Amendment activity.
Just like the Nazi marches in heavily Jewish Holocaust Survivor populated Skokie in 1976, it is provocative, intentionally inflammatory speech in the war of ideas.
Like in Skokie, the City denying access to a public location based on the content of the speech and how much anguish it causes people, will be met with a lawsuit that the City will lose. Like in Skokie, the lawsuit will likely be lead by the ACLU, which is committed (or at least they were) so strongly committed to the principle of free speech, that they will lead the case for free.
This piece is a mosaic of inter-sectionalist politics hoping to reap every morsel of outrage we have left.
@1: it was deliberately provocative. they drove 5 hours from Spokane, seeking persecution from the godless sodomites of Capitol Hill.
sure, they have the right to do that, but they’re still assholes for doing it, just like the Black Israelite loons and Westboro loons and Larouche loons are.
@3, The First Amendment was written to protect assholes from outlawing being an asshole.
This sounds like the progressive version of “she was asking for it”. Are progressives really so fragile that the provocative act of seeing those who they disagree with them sends them into such rage that they feel the need to lash out. We had a similar message earlier this week where we were told the protests were “peaceful” until the police showed up and once again the presence of the police was enough to trigger folks to spray paint obsenities everywhere, vandalize public buildings and set things on fire. If one of these groups comes to town and is advocating for violence or engages in unlawful behavior they should feel the full force of the law and be banned from doing anything in the future. Pretending they are the cause of the violent and destructive response from the perennial losers in our community who take any opportunity they can to engage in this behavior is gaslighting and only serves to provide the incidents these groups are looking for. I don’t understand why we can’t say enough of the destruction and hate and similarly condemn those who respond to these things with their own brand of evil.
This article just might be the dumbest thing ever published on Slog, and that’s saying a lot.
The ideas espoused by these “Christians” are preached every Sunday (and sometimes Wednesdays!) all over the Puget Sound region – including Seattle – and that has been the case since the Denny Party landed at Alki.
Bringing it to Seattle proper is nothing new. I remember well when the televangelist Benny Hinn booked what is now the Climate Pledge Arena for a week for a “revival.” Before him, Billy Graham used to have revivals in Seattle as well. And who doesn’t recall the evangelicals that taunted (and perhaps still do) the Pride parades.
I very much agree that this is a “dick move” (as the kids say) but it is protected speech.
@3 Yes, they are assholes!
Which is why you IGNORE their stupid rallys.
Don’t give them footage they can use for fundraising. You are not going to convert them out of their cult. Let them jerk off by themselves, which they will do anyway.
@6
No Hannah Krieg’s ode to the entrepreneurs “flipping merchandise” on 3rd Avenue is the dumbest thing ever published by the Stranger
“Just look to Los Angeles as a recent example of a city that stepped up to defend its Latinx and immigrant communities”
Latinx is an ignorant term used by non-native speakers who have no understanding of the Spanish language.
Amy Herzfeld-Copple should contemplate that we on the left side of the political spectrum “need to use language that comes from the factory line and not the faculty lounge.”
We got our asses handed to us in the 2024 elections. We aren’t climbing out of this hole without acknowledging some serious mistakes.
@9 – Oh shit I forgot about that. You are correct.
From this astoundingly stupid article: “defend its Latinx”
I am going out tonight to eat a burritx, and also some nachx, drink a few cervezx, have a couple of glasses of agux to stay hydrated, after that I will go to Pony where ex bailx fue muy divertidx.
Holy shit white Seattle liberal “progressives” are so fucking cringe
Hilarious how a white/Jewish woman (Amy Herzfeld-Copple) is now dictating the Spanish language to us
Check your “white privilege” lady
Voy a comer ahora enchiladx, chili con carnx, quesx, fajitx, tamalx, tacx, guacamolx, tortillx sopx, and lots of other amazing LATINO foods you naive white-guilt Seattle “progressives” know nothing about.
Ugh, thanks for reminding me about this again. I had nearly forgotten this bigot rally, but thankfully for the bigots, the writer of this story is keeping them in our minds.
So who’s really creating our outrage? The bigots? Or our own shit Seattle writers who need the outrage to sell advertising space?
This woman, Amy Herzfeld-Copple, runs a “nonprofit”, Western States Center, that had a total revenue of $4.68 million in 2023. Where does all that money go? To pay her to write stupid articles like this? There’s a good reason the term “Nonprofit Industrial System” exists.
“Amy Herzfeld-Copple is the Executive Director at Western States Center, a national leader committed to building a thriving inclusive democracy in the West and beyond. For nearly 40 years, the organization has partnered with civic, faith, and community leaders across the Pacific Northwest and Mountain states—regions deeply impacted by authoritarianism and organized bigotry. Rooted in racial and gender justice, their work builds lasting power, strengthens cross-community solidarity, and supports local leaders and institutions to stand firm in the face of ongoing threats.”
How, exactly, does any of that cost $4.68 million a year? I smell a scam.
@12
I’m growing the paradigm of intersectionality and multi-racial non-patriarchal organic alternative for Latinx and cross-gender functionality.
Amy Herzfeld-Copple is the Executive Director at W
damn webs.
“Amy Herzfeld-Copple is the Executive Director at…”
Executive directors who capitalize their job titles are the worst.
The appeals to Free Speech and Religious Liberty aren’t “disingenuous.” The First Amendment exists to protect every American’s right to be loudly and vocally wrong.