Happy Pride: it's a democracy thing.

Taking a moment to celebrate and champion the Hungarian LGBTQ+ activists and allies who defied Viktor Orbán's autocratic ban on Pride, sending a global message of united resistance.

Happy Pride all!

By all, I mean, all who champion democracy and LGBTQ+ rights, and are rising up in Europe, and South America, and the US, and across the world to refuse authoritarianism….

Today, I’m celebrating Pride by highlighting the historic Budapest Pride march that is still celebrating its massive turnout. It was the largest yet in Hungary — over 200,000 people — and a major blow to the ongoing effort by Hungary’s autocratic leader, Viktor Orbán, to clamp down on freedom of speech and assembly by banning Pride. The response of activists and citizens there is a model for us in the US to learn from and take heart. That’s also why this year’s theme for the New York City Dyke March is Dykes Say No To Fascism.

As many readers of this newsletter know, Orbán is the champion of illiberalism, and his hardline regime is viewed as a model for deconstructing democracy, one that weaponized attacks on immigrants, then LGBTQ+ groups, and launched a culture war on “woke,” gender, and diversity policies — a familiar divide-and-conquer strategy. Orbán’s regime is one Trump admires, while Project 2025 benefited from the input of Hungarian think tanks linked to Orbán.

Weeks ago, Orbán began freshly attacking LGBTQ+ people and called for a ban on Pride after seeing his popularity slip in a recent national poll that showed his Fidesz ruling party trailed 15 points behind the centre-right opposition Tisza party, led by Peter Magyar. An Orbán-dominated Parliament followed suit to pass a law outlawing Pride. Orbán also clamped down on foreign NGOs, claiming they were the reason why Hungary is resisting his authoritarian rule, and blaming George Soros and outside money for the rise of Hungary’s people power resistance. Hungary became first EU country to ban a Pride march, while Orban said he’d been inspired by Trump’s attacks on DEI. Orbán threatened anyone participating with legal repercussions.

Parade organizers were warned they could face up to a year in prison, while anyone marching could face a 500-Euros fine. The authorities warned foreign embassies against supporting any Pride or LGBTQ+ events. They also put up facial-recognition cameras on lampposts along the route of the planned Pride march. For weeks, known LGBTQ+ activists were attacked on social media, and threatened with violence by pro-Orbán far-right forces.

That did not deter the brave Hungarian LGBTQ+ organizers — or the massive crowd of Hungarians and visitors to the capital who showed up. Some 200,000 people marched in Budapest for the 30th annual celebration of Pride — by conservative estimates — and despite heavy police presence and Orban’s ongoing punitive rhetoric. That’s a huge increase from the 35,000 people who showed up for Pride last year. They included participants from 30 different countries, including 70 members of the European Parliament. Europe showed up, in other words, willing to risk a 500-Euros fine.

On Friday, 70 Hungarian civil society groups also published an open letter in support of the march, saying the law that banned Pride “serves to intimidate the entire society.” Across Europe, allyship also spoke out strongly: EU Chief Ursula von der Leyen called on Orbán’s regime to reverse the Pride ban, while EU Equalities Commissioner Hadja Lahbib spoke in support of the parade on Friday in Hungary. Some 33 countries, most EU members, also released a statement supporting the march.

Pre-march, Budapest's opposition mayor Gergely Karacsony also insisted that no attendee should face reprisals since the march was a municipal event that did not require police approval.

“The right to assembly is a basic human right, and I don’t think it should be banned. Just because someone does not like the reason why you go to the street, or they do not agree with it, you still have the right to do so,” said Krisztina Aranyi to the Irish Times, summing up a common viewpoint expressed by participants to the media at the march.

In response, Orbán has lambasted Pride marchers and levied new anger at Europe’s leaders for defying his orders, too. He repeated his threat of using the new facial recognition footage to punish participants. Good luck — that’s 200,000+ people.

Photo: Attila Kisbenedek/AFP via Getty Images

People cross Elisabeth Bridge during the Budapest Pride March in Budapest, Hungary, June 28, 2025.

Photo: Bernadett Szabo | Reuters

As we saw with the Hands Off marches in the US, a growing number of people in the Budapest march were reportedly first-time participants to Pride who now view the defense of LGBTQ+ rights as their issue, too— synonymous with the rights of their democracy that Orbán has moved to outlaw. The same thing was recently seen in Argentina, where Javier Millei has unleashed his war on gender and woke, going after LGBTQ+ people (and immigrants). Pride activists were warned they’d be arrested, and threatened with violence by far-right groups. They refused to stay home, too. So did many allies.

The February 1 march in Buenos Aires, also a watershed LGBTQ+-led event, drew a record crowd, including the notable presence of unions and other sectors who showed up for the first time in a large way. There were marches all across the country, and abroad, in major cities where Brazilians in the diaspora organized events. The union members in Buenos Aires said what newcomers to Pride in Budapest said today: this goes beyond LGBTQ rights. They are attacking immigrants and gay people today; tomorrow, it’s the rest of us. This is about defending our democracy. Everyone needs to be speaking out.

That’s the same thing many Americans marching today for Pride are saying. LGBTQ+ rights are part of our human rights. It’s a democracy thing. We can’t stay silent.

Across the US, organizers of Pride events have reported a major withdrawal of LGBTQ+ event funding by corporate donors and private foundations afraid of reprisals by the Trump administration. We are witnessing a major backlash. That hurt, but not stopped, Pride organizers from moving ahead with June Pride events and marches. Many organizers called on other sectors of local communities to join them at these events as an important act of solidarity — to show everyone that Americans understand that the multiplying attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, including the re-criminalization of transgender identity, are part of an authoritarian crackdown, as is Trump’s massive attack on immigrants and asylum seekers.

After 14 years in power, Hungary’s Orban has slipped in the polls, and is attacking LGBTQ+ people and Pride in an effort to silence critics and suppress freedom of assembly.

Photo: John Thys | AFP via Getty Images

Like Orbán and Millei (and Vladimir Putin and others), Trump is using classic tools in the autocrat’s playbook to try to seed division in America, to polarize groups, to maintain a red-blue divide, to point to one group and blame them for the ills faced or felt by others. To promote his us-against-them, Maga-and-America First-against-the-rest-of -the-world, fear-based propaganda, infused with disinformation.

The response is to unite, to seek common cause and build intersectional coalitions, under the banner of democracy. That is working in Hungary, and in Argentina, and is being noted by groups fighting other autocrats elsewhere. I won’t be surprised to hear of larger and broader numbers of Pride march crowds than ever across the US when the numbers are tallied at the end of June and summer. Why? Because more Americans have made the same connection as Hungarians and Argentinians. As a sign held up in the Budapest march proclaimed, None of us are free until everyone is free. That is the new-old mantra for fighting back.

Dictators seek to render critics invisible and silent; the response is to refuse invisibility and speak out. As in Hungary, as in Buenos Aires, as across America. Let us take to the streets this weekend and all month, with our neighbors, in joy, and a spirited defense of our values and our lives. Not just this month of June, not just for Pride, but for immigrants, and vets, and federal employees, and kids in college and all the groups being targeted. For as long as it takes to reclaim our democracy.

Let us all resist with Pride.