City officials from Lansing, Mich., raise a Pride flag over the Lansing City Council at the beginning of this month. Some Republican governors are relabeling June, widely recognized as Pride Month, with conservative-friendly monikers such as “Nuclear Family Month.” (Photo by Katherine Dailey/Michigan Advance)
A half dozen Republican governors are pushing alternative labels for June, which is widely recognized in the United States as Pride Month.
Without explicitly tying their efforts to a replacement of Pride Month — which celebrates the LGBTQ+ community — GOP governors in states including Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Nebraska, Tennessee and Utah have labeled June with conservative-friendly monikers that celebrate one type of family unit: a man and woman who are married with children.
The proclamations don’t carry the weight of law, but they are public statements about the kind of families that leadership in those states want to promote.
In Tennessee, GOP state lawmakers passed a resolution signed by Republican Gov. Bill Lee designating June as “Nuclear Family Month.” The resolution labels a ‘nuclear family’ as “one husband, one wife, and any biological, adopted or fostered children” and calls it “God’s design for familial structure.”
Indiana’s Republican Gov. Mike Braun also declared June “nuclear family month” in a proclamation with wording similar to Tennessee’s. Braun told reporters the proclamation wasn’t intended to send a message to other types of families, the Indiana Capital Chronicle reported.
In Alabama, Republican Gov. Kay Ivey declared June as “Strong Families Month.” Her official announcement of the designation highlighted the role of fathers as “head of the household.”
In Nebraska, Republican Gov. Jim Pillen designated June as “Marriage and Family Month,” with a proclamation saying “God’s design” for marriage is a family with one husband, one wife and children.
Pillen called it “the most important proclamation I’ve ever had the privilege to sign.”
The Republican governors of Arkansas and Utah declared June “Fidelity Month,” defining fidelity as dedication to faith, family and country. The proclamations don’t explicitly describe the composition of those families. The idea of a “Fidelity Month” was first proposed and promoted a few years ago by a conservative Christian legal scholar.
Arkansas Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders posted about her declaration on X by sharing a link to an article calling such efforts “counter-programming” to Pride Month.
But the rebranding of June marks a departure for Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, who declared June as Pride Month during his first three years in office and has previously expressed remorse for his attitude about gay people.
Pride Month celebrates LGBTQ+ history and culture, and serves as a platform to increase visibility for queer communities that continue to fight for civil rights and equality. It’s marked by celebratory parades, concerts and festivals in every state.
LGBTQ+ advocates have called the rebranding efforts “disappointing” and a deliberate attempt to erase communities that are already vulnerable.
“Pride month is a celebration that uplifts marginalized folks and gives them resources to survive and spaces where they can thrive,” the Utah-based organization Project Rainbow posted in a statement about Cox’s choice to designate June as Fidelity Month.
Advocates say the month is not only about celebration, but also provides important opportunities to support queer people. In 2023, the most recent year for which data is available, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that more than 3 in 5 LGBTQ+ high school students experienced “persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness” in the previous year. One in 5 LGBTQ+ participants in the CDC’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey said they had attempted suicide.
While Republican governors have mostly shied away from directly mentioning Pride Month or tying their month-naming efforts to its erasure, some elected officials have been more explicit.
Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles, a Republican, posted from his official X account, “Homosexuality has no place in America. Happy Nuclear Family Month” on June 1 but later deleted it.
Indiana Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith, a Republican, shared an illustrated version of the proclamation on social media, titled “Take back the Rainbow!” and depicting a heterosexual white couple with children.
Stateline reporter Anna Claire Vollers can be reached at avollers@stateline.org
This story was originally produced by Stateline, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Alabama Reflector, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
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Author: Anna Claire Vollers