Emily Fritz | a&e editor

On Election Night in Bloomfield, Trace Brewing live-streamed news coverage onto a large projector at one end of the bar-cafe. Prior to, they hosted the Harris campaign for phone banking and informational sessions — much of their patronage continued to canvas and volunteer down to the campaign’s final moments.

“We want[ed] it to be, you know, a welcoming space for our guests,” said Aadam Soorma, head of marketing and guest experience at Trace Brewing. “[But] at some point, we turned it off just to maintain a sense of sanity and any semblance of happiness.”

Although 429,000 voters in Allegheny County cast their ballots for Vice President Kamala Harris, the deep blue stronghold in Pennsylvania quickly realized that the state had flipped to red and would stay that way for the evening.

As a venue with a diverse staff and open support of the LGBTQ+ community, the results of the election created an increase in anxiety prior to the inauguration ceremony on Jan. 20.

Now, many in the community are bracing for the worst. Some are preparing additional documentation for their families — like marriage licenses and adoption certificates — while others are preparing to emigrate altogether.

“I’m checking all of my beneficiary designations,” one TikTok user said in a video. “I’m checking my retirement accounts. I’m checking my life insurance policy, checking my bank accounts, anything with the beneficiary designation — I’m making sure [my wife] is named.”

Videos like these began circulating immediately after the Associated Press declared Trump as winner. With a red shift in Senate seats, a held majority in the House and potential for more Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices, even the bi-partisan state government in Pennsylvania has the local LGBTQ+ community on its toes.

Transgender Rights & Gender-Affirming Care

Though there were many issues at stake in the last election cycle, the rhetoric around human rights and public safety tended to center around the same issue through opposing lenses: transgender people.

Lane Alexander of Squirrel Hill, who identifies as a transgender man, recalled hearing an ad for Senator-elect, Dave McCormick (R-Pa.), which centered on the villainization of transgender women.

“It’s like, ‘Bob Casey wants to let the transgenders play sports. Bob Casey wants to let men in women’s sports, and that’s horrible and disgusting,’” he said, paraphrasing. “Honestly, it feels so strange because, … just living as an identity, there’s not really anything political about it. I’m just trying to live my life.”

Already, the LGBTQ+ community is feeling the heat from conservative powers at the Supreme Court level, as they determine who should have access to gender-affirming care — like puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy — and at what age.

Access to gender-affirming care reduces the likelihood of suicide in the transgender community, according to studies cited by the American Civil Liberties Union.

“It was in 2020 when I started transitioning. And that was sort of a decision out of necessity, I was sort of at the point where I was either going to transition or not be alive,” said Eryka Wilson, a transgender woman from Lawrenceville. “I think most Americans do not know trans people … They don’t know [their] struggles.”

Cisgender members of the LGBTQ+ community have also begun to grieve for transgender rights, not only because they fear for the next queer-restricting decision, but because it directly impacts their greater network.

“I might be a parent faced with this someday,” said Julie Lang, housing operations assistant at Duquesne University. “Just because it doesn’t affect me doesn’t mean it doesn’t affect people that I love and care about. This is really scary for me and my friends.”

Codifying Gay Marriage

As people across the nation prepare additional copies of their marriage licenses and name their same-sex spouse by name in end-of-life documents like wills and insurance policies, the next concern centers around marriage equality.

Following the 2022 Dobbs decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a concurring opinion that the justices “should reconsider all of this court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell.”

Bruce Antkowiak, a law professor at Saint Vincent College, said that an upheaval of federal law is unlikely.

“A person probably needs a lot longer than four years to make a very profound change in the way that the federal government operates and in how certain policies are carried out,” he said. “The Supreme Court is loathe to make changes [or] reverse precedent, unless they feel there is truly a compelling need to do so.”

Despite the Respect for Marriage Act, which recognizes the validity of same-sex marriages and civil partnerships and was passed in December of the same year, many LGBTQ+ people are not convinced that their right to a legally recognized union couldn’t be stripped away during the next Trump administration.

“It’s been a really upsetting time thinking about the fact that as a lesbian if I do want to get married, and things go sideways in the next four years, I didn’t meet the right person in time to be able to get married, and I might never be able to,” Lang said.

For those who are already married, the legal status of their union could have detrimental impacts to their health and safety should an emergency occur.

In many life-threatening medical events, hospitals will only permit family or next of kin to make decisions about the incapacitated. If a same-sex marriage is no longer recognized, these decisions may be stalled or put into the hands of an untrusted third party, like an estranged parent or sibling.

“There does come other things with marriage that are important to my husband and I’s relationship,” Alexander said. “Having that taken away is a little terrifying.”

Though there are fewer cases of families moving abroad, many are already talking about evasive action. Should the circumstances in Pennsylvania change, he and his husband are willing to move to New York, and later leave the U.S. if need be.

The Next Four Years & Beyond

In an increasingly polarized political climate, Trump has attempted to walk back some of the alt-right rumors surrounding his return to the White House, saying that it’s “unlikely” that mifepristone, commonly known as the abortion pill, will be restricted by the Food and Drug Administration.

However, this has done little to convince the LGBTQ+ community not to raise alarms.

“I don’t think anybody has any reason to trust him because everything that’s in Project 2025 aligns with things that he said,” said Duquesne senior Emma Dale. “On the campaign trail, he’s said all these horrible things about trans people [and] about women … You can’t just backtrack.”

Wilson is not convinced it would matter anyway. She believes that the way to an American’s vote is through their wallet.

“As the old saying goes, ‘It’s the economy, stupid,’” Wilson said. “People will always vote their pocketbook, and people felt like the past four years have not been good on their pocketbook.”

In a similar vein, one of the primary concerns — which transcends sexuality and gender expression on the left — is the fate of the Supreme Court. During his first term, Trump successfully appointed three of the sitting justices: Neil M. Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.

Because the justices are permitted to serve until resignation, retirement or death, his appointments are likely to shape the judicial branch of the country for several years. With Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas in their mid-70s, it would not be far-reaching for Trump to appoint another.

“​​[The justices] were appointed to their positions by political people and they’re not unaware of the political ramifications of what they do or what they are asked to do,” Antkowiak said. “You hope, though, that in deciding matters of principle and matters of constitutional law, [that] they are able to to put those more fundamental principles at the forefront.”

Next Steps in the Community

The most immediate fear concerns personal safety. Very few are planning to change their identity expression; instead, they plan to find safety in numbers.

For Trace Brewing, this means a change in event planning and management.

“We have talked about just adding a little bit more security or a door person during those events, making sure that during a drag event … there isn’t anyone rolling in that either shouldn’t be here or is hateful or feels a certain way about [the LGBTQ+] community,” Soorma said.

While Pittsburgh hasn’t experienced a violent attack on LGBTQ+ people like Orlando, Florida did in 2016 at the Pulse nightclub, this doesn’t make the area immune from hate, like that seen in the Tree of Life synagogue shooting of 2018.

These events have and continue to influence Dale’s behavior in public. She and her long-time girlfriend plan to police themselves more sternly, seldom holding hands when in public, save for explicitly queer-friendly events.

“That’s our way of survival. I wish it didn’t have to be that way, especially because it’s important for young queer people to see queerness in everyday life, like seeing a lesbian couple hold hands for example, but that’s just how it has to be sometimes,” she said.

Having grown up in a more rural setting, this is something that she’s become familiar with. As the political needle of the country points more conservative, it’s likely that many others who identify as LGBTQ+ will have to do the same.

Despite the successful assimilation of LGBTQ+ people into mainstream society over the last 20 years, the potential turning back of rights and social norms could last for the foreseeable future.

“November 5 put us back a generation,” Wilson said.