The creator of the Trans Pride Flag is calling on the Biden administration to fly the pink, white, and blue banner at U.S. embassies around the world.
In a January 21 letter, Monica Helms, the flag’s creator, wrote to the administration asking that “embassies also fly the Transgender Pride Flag along side [sic] of the Rainbow Flag in solidarity with the Trans Community.” Just hours before she sat down to write that plea, Secretary of State Antony Blinken signaled that President Joe Biden intends to strike down a Trump-era ban barring U.S. embassies on foreign soil from displaying LGBTQ+ Pride flags in solidarity with the queer and trans community.
“Trans people in many countries are being murdered at an alarming rate, especially in places like Brazil, Mexico and many African and Latin American countries,” Helms said in the message, which was later posted to Facebook. “With our embassies flying the Trans Flag along with the Rainbow Flag, we will send a strong message that America respects it's [sic] Trans Community, giving trans people in that country hope.”
“We have been vilified and discriminated [against] over the last four years and having you in the White House gives us hope,” she added. “America needs to show ALL of it's [sic] true colors to the world, and I hope some of those colors are light blue, pink and white.”
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While Helms can’t recall ever having seen her iconic flag flown at a U.S. embassy before, she believes the display would represent a major change after withstanding four years of Donald Trump’s attacks on the transgender community. The prior administration stripped away everything from the ability of trans homeless people to access shelters that align with their gender to the rights of trans students to use the bathroom that they feel most comfortable with at school.
Helms, a veteran who served in the Navy for eight years, was particularly devastated after Trump decided to ban trans people from serving in the military — a decision that was overturned during Biden’s first week in office.
“Every week was something new, and it just went on and on and on,” she told them. “Everything that we could have taken away from us, we did.”
According to Helms, Biden has already done “more in a week than Trump ever would ever have done” for LGBTQ+ rights in office. This includes signing a historic executive order affirming the government’s commitment to LGBTQ+ equality, a sweeping declaration that extends the Supreme Court’s Bostock v. Hodges ruling to areas like housing, education, and health care. It prevents everything from a federally funded clinic from turning away trans patients to a Section 8 housing center refusing the application of someone living with HIV.
While Helms was “totally elated” to see that Biden has begun turning the page on the last four years, she wrote the letter because she knows that many countries around the world continue to suffer under anti-LGBTQ+ administrations. Last year, Hungary banned trans people from correcting the gender marker listed on their birth certificate and outlawed same-sex adoptions. More than 150 municipalities in Poland have passed resolutions since 2019 declaring themselves “LGBT free.”
“Everybody else in the world saw all the things that he did to us,” Helms said. “I want them to see that this is going to be a better time for us. And maybe it will be a better time for them, too.”
Helms has yet to hear back from the Biden administration regarding her request, but she remains hopeful that the Trans Pride flag will soon join Gilbert Baker’s rainbow banner at U.S. embassies around the world. There’s no reason not to be optimistic: Although the design was only created in 1999, it has been flown on all seven continents, including Antarctica, and put on display at the Smithsonian. A trans mountain climber is planning to plant it at the top of Mt. Everest in the coming years.
While she hopes it doesn’t impact the White House’s decision, Helms admitted she has an “even higher goal” than seeing the Pride flag waving at a foreign embassy or the world’s highest peak.
“I want to see it on the International Space Station,” she said. “If you ever see pictures of them up there, they got this whole string of flags for all the different people that have come on the International Space Station. It'd be cool to see the rainbow flag and trans flag up with those flags as well.”
That might appear to be a lofty mission, but Helms believes she has a contact to make her dream a reality. “I figure, ‘Hey, if I don't ask, it ain't gonna happen,’” she added.
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