Police Pepper-Spray LGBTQIA+ Protesters: Seattle’s Shameful Crackdown on Queer Resistance
Opposing fascism includes ending police violence and building a world where LGBTQIA+ communities thrive without fear.
A few years ago, I was pepper sprayed by the Seattle Police Department (SPD) while standing on a sidewalk, talking on the phone, trying to arrange a ride to my son’s second birthday party. I had just finished giving the last speech at the annual MLK Day rally that marched downtown when the SPD unloaded chemical weapons into my face. That moment changed me—and it’s one of the reasons watching the recent videos of Seattle police pepper spraying LGBTQIA+ protesters in the face hit me so hard.
On Saturday, May 24 at Cal Anderson Park, a known gathering space in the heart of Seattle’s LGBTQIA+ community, the violence unfolded as a far-right, anti-LGBTQ+ group held a Christian nationalist “Mayday USA” rally under the asinine banner, “#DontMessWithOurKids.” This event marked the first known clash between police and protesters since the Seattle City Council rolled back protections in February that approved the renewed use of chemical weapons like tear gas, pepper spray, and blast balls for so-called “crowd control.” These restrictions on the tools of state violence had been enacted after the Seattle Police Department rioted in response to the uprising for Black lives of 2020.
That fascists would want to insert their hateful, transphobic, and homophobic message directly into the LGBTQIA+ community is predictable. But the absolutely shameful fact is that Seattle Parks officials recommended that this anti-LGBTQ+ group hold their rally at Cal Anderson Park—they hadn’t even originally planned to hold it there. “This park was not the first or even the second location that event organizers sought a permit for, but the Seattle Special Events Office suggested it as a suitable alternative,” a Mayday USA spokesperson said in a statement. Cal Anderson Park, named for Seattle’s first openly gay city council member, is a space beloved and defended by the queer community. To push this rally into the heart of Seattle's LGBTQIA+ neighborhood was a calculated move by city officials—a provocation designed to spark conflict.
A couple of days later, these christian nationalist forces rallied at Seattle’s City Hall and began praising Seattle police for their support, chanting, “SPD! SPD! SPD!” One of the organizers, Pastor Russell Johnson, even bragged, “If that makes me a fascist, sign me up.” Let that sink in: the fascists openly praised the police — and the SPD was observed to have clearly sided with the fascists — they proudly embraced the label of fascism, and rallied with the support of state violence, while queer protesters were met with pepper spray and mass arrests.
On May 30th, the Seattle Times published an Op-Ed about the incidents whose author argued:
“Both sides have the right to present their perspectives with the expectation that they’ll be treated with respect… Though it may be difficult to abide an opponent’s opinion on a subject near and dear to one’s heart, that’s exactly what individuals and organizations must do in order to keep the peace we all value and cherish.”
While liberal Seattle loves to assert its commitment to “tolerance” and “peaceful dialogue,” let me say it plainly: Calmly negotiating with fascists while they deny your right to exist is not “keeping the peace.”
There is a war being waged on LGBTQIA+ people—by the state and by the raising forces of fascism it is enabling. They are denying trans people healthcare, banning books that tell LGBTQIA+ stories, prohibiting trans youth from playing sports, demonizing drag performers, physically assaulting queer people, and criminalizing educators who teach the truth. LGBTQIA+ folks can’t “keep the peace”—because there is no peace to keep when the state is waging a war on your rights. The so-called “peace” is a lie; everyday life in America -– even when protests aren’t happening — isn’t the presence of peace, but rather the suffocation of QTBIPOC communities through erasure, systemic violence, and oppression.
By the end of two rightwing rallies, 31 people had been arrested across the two events—every single one of them from the side of the LGBTQIA+ protesters. Not a single person from the far-right group was arrested. It’s hard to imagine a greater gift Seattle could have given the Mayday tour as it rolls off to its next rally site in Los Angeles.
This is a modern-day revival of the Lavender Scare, when an intense war was waged on queer people who were targeted, demonized, and erased from public life under McCarthyism and Cold War paranoia. And it’s a key part of the rising fascist movement emboldened by Donald Trump.
One of the central strategies of advancing this neo-Lavender Scare has been the passing of “Don’t Say Gay” and “Don’t Say Trans” laws in schools that seek to erase LGBTQ+ identity and history.
But as Audre Lorde taught us, “Your silence will not protect you.” We cannot be silent in the face of this assault. We cannot “abide” hate. We must resist—with collective action. Believing fascist will quietly go away if we just pretend they aren’t there or if we try to reason with them is never how fascist movements have been quelled. Instead it has always been mass mobilizations that have outnumbered and demoralized fascists that have made the difference.
This is why we need to show up—loud, proud, and unafraid. We need Pride rallies that remember that the first Pride was a riot—sparked when trans women of color like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera fought back against police raids and repression. We need everyone who opposes fascism, book bans, bans on Black history, and attacks on trans youth to join us on Saturday, June 7, for the Teach Truth National Day of Action. There are already over 170 events scheduled across the country—from Alaska to Puerto Rico—to defend the freedom to learn and push back against the laws and policies that are erasing LGBTQIA+ people, banning books, and silencing truth.
One of Seattle’s Teach Truth Day actions will be held at the Meredith Mathews East Madison YMCA—a site of the 1966 Freedom Schools—to celebrate that legacy and keep the fight alive. We’re not just teaching history; we’re making it.
They want to ban the truth, ban joy, and ban young people’s right to learn, grow, and thrive as their full selves. That’s why we need to connect the dots between policy and policing, between anti-education laws and anti-LGBTQ+ violence, and between the culture of repression and the machinery of the state. It’s all part of the same assault—and we must fight it on all fronts.
We must immediately reinstate restrictions on the Seattle Police Department’s use of force—no pepper spray, no batons, no tear gas. But more than that, we must divest from policing and invest in community care. The billions hoarded by the rich—money extracted from our labor—should fund housing, healthcare, education, mental health support, and investments into QTBIPOC communities.
Join us. Defend LGBTQIA+ lives. Defend the right to learn. Fight fascism.
Find a Teach Truth Day of Action near you: https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/teach-truth-day-of-action-2025-events/
Come to the Seattle event on June 7:
https://publicschoolstrong.controlshift.app/events/teach-in-at-meredith-mathews-east-madison-ymca
As Fannie Lou Hamer said, “Nobody’s Free Until Everybody’s Free.” Let’s fight for a world where our kids have the freedom to learn, love who they choose to love, and be who they want to be.