Comparing Trump and Harris’ views on LGBTQ rights, marriage equality

Washington — Among the topics voters may consider in the 2024 presidential election are LGBTQ rights — and it’s an issue where former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have starkly different messages and backgrounds.
A large majority of Americans support legal protections for LGBTQ people, according to a survey from the Public Religion Research Institute. But support is stronger in blue states than red states, and has declined overall in recent years — especially among Republicans. And support for same-sex marriage has also seen a slight decline.
Meanwhile, 38% of Americans said LGBTQ rights are a factor in their voting decisions, and 30% say they will vote only for a candidate who aligns with them on the issue. 
Here’s what to know about the candidates’ views and records on the issue:
The former president has been inconsistent on the issue during his time in the public eye, and his administration rolled back protections for LGBTQ people — especially transgender individuals.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, before he entered politics, Trump expressed support for domestic partnership laws that granted couples the same benefits of married couples — a position that the GOP widely opposed at the time — and often showed personal tolerance for LGBTQ issues more broadly. In a 1999 interview, where he also said he was “very pro-choice” Trump said that “it would not disturb me” for gay people to serve in the military. 
Years later, Trump said in 2011, amid speculation about a possible presidential bid, that he was “opposed to gay marriage.” In 2015, he said he supports “traditional marriage.”
Trump became the first GOP presidential nominee to mention LGBTQ issues in his 2016 RNC speech, pledging to protect the community in the aftermath of the Pulse nightclub shooting. 
Trump chose a conservative running mate in 2016, Mike Pence, who had staunchly opposed same-sex marriage, but Trump’s own comments on the topic varied. 
Trump said during his 2016 campaign that he would “strongly consider” appointing Supreme Court justices who would overturn the 2015 ruling that legalized same-sex marriages. Then, days after he was elected, he said he was “fine” with same-sex marriage and suggested he wouldn’t appoint justices to the high court with the goal of overturning the ruling. His wife, Melania Trump, called him “the first president to enter the White House supporting gay marriage” as he sought reelection in 2020.
On transgender issues, Trump said in 2016, amid a controversy over a North Carolina bathroom ban, that transgender people should “use the bathroom they feel is appropriate.” But his administration went on to reverse a policy that required schools to allow transgender students to use bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity, and his administration banned some transgender people from serving in the military while Trump was in office — a policy that President Biden reversed. Trump’s administration also tried to repeal health protections for transgender people and sought to end protections for transgender individuals in federal prison, among other policies.
Anti-trans sentiments would go on to become a prominent talking point for Republicans on the campaign trail in the 2022 midterm elections. In early 2023, Trump said he would use his powers, should he return to the White House, to punish doctors who provide gender affirming care for minors and impose consequences for teachers who discuss it with students. 
In the final months of the 2024 campaign, Trump and his allies leaned into anti-trans rhetoric, spending millions on advertisements focusing on the issue in battleground states.  
Meanwhile, Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance, sponsored legislation in 2023 that would ban access to gender-affirming care for minors, along with a bill to bar the State Department from allowing the gender marker “X” on passports. The Ohio Republican also said he would vote no on the Respect for Marriage Act, which provided federal protections for same-sex and interracial marriages, while campaigning for Senate in 2022, citing religious liberty concerns.
Harris has generally been an early adopter of pro-LGBTQ policies and stances, doing so before other prominent members of her party.
The former San Francisco district attorney officiated some of the nation’s first same-sex marriages in 2004, after then-mayor Gavin Newsom directed the county clerk to approve the marriages although the law didn’t yet recognize them. The marriages were invalidated months later. Then, when she was elected as California’s attorney general in 2010, Harris said she would not defend in court a voter-approved measure known as Proposition 8, which outlawed same-sex marriage.
As district attorney, Harris had prosecuted violence against LGBTQ people, establishing a hate crime unit to look into crimes against LGBTQ youth. As attorney general, she sought to end the “panic defense” that allowed homicide defendants to seek lesser sentences if they attested to being panicked by the victim’s sexual orientation. 
Harris has been criticized by LGBTQ advocates for denying gender-affirming surgeries for transgender inmates when she served as attorney general; she said she was bound by the Department of Corrections policy in place at the time. She later expressed support for providing such care to inmates during her 2020 presidential bid. During that campaign, where she ran on a more progressive platform, Harris also said she supports decriminalizing sex work, though she noted that it’s not a simple issue.
As a senator, Harris sponsored a handful of bills aimed at addressing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, along with other LGBTQ issues. Harris’ record has also been tied to the Biden administration, which expanded Title IX protections for LGBTQ students, although they were blocked by the Supreme Court. In 2022, Mr. Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law, enshrining federal protections for same-sex and interracial marriages. 
Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, has a reputation as an advocate for LGBTQ rights. When Walz was a high school teacher, he served as the faculty adviser who helped form his school’s first gay-straight alliance in the ’90s.