The Stonewall National Monument Visitor Center is the first LGBTQ center in the National Park Service. — Courtesy of Stephen Kent Johnson
(NEW YORK) — Mark Segal was 18 years old and had only lived in New York City for six weeks when he found himself at the center of the Stonewall Uprising in 1969.
The very spot where Segal once danced, drank and took part in one of the most consequential moments in LGBTQ history is now the first LGBTQ visitor center within the National Park System.
“Before Stonewall, there were no more than 100 out activists in the entire United States of America on that first Pride,” said Segal, now 73. “Today, if you look around the world, there are millions of people who celebrate Pride. And it all started in that building.”
The Stonewall National Monument Visitor Center, which opened to the public Friday, is what Segal would have hoped for over 55 years ago as a Stonewall veteran.
“If we are visible, that creates dialogue. Dialogue creates education, education creates equality,” said Segal.
The Stonewall Uprising on June 28, 1969, began in response to a routine police raid on a gay bar, according to the Library of Congress.
Segal recalls the lights in the bar blinking on and off — signifying the arrival of the police who would typically “come in, take some money and leave.” But that’s not what he says happened that night.
“The police burst through the doors, started breaking up the bar, started throwing liquor bottles around, took people and threw them up against the wall — screamed, shouted, it was the most violent thing I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Segal.
Patrons responded by fighting back, entrapping the police in the bar: “We were in an uprising against those who oppressed us. For the first time in history, the people that are always incarcerating us, we were now incarcerating them,” Segal said.
Before the 1960s, living openly as a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer person was largely illegal, according to the National Park Service.
“At that time, we as a community were totally invisible,” said Segal. “LGBT people were not in newspapers, were not in magazines, were not radio, not in television.”
NYPD officials have since apologized for past anti-LGBTQ practices and the raid of Stonewall.
The Stonewall Inn, as it stands today, only holds a part of where the original bar once stood. The visitor’s center is now housed in the other half of the original bar — reclaiming the dark LGBTQ history of the location.
“The power of place can be felt walking through the Greenwich Village streets where people stood up and spoke out, paving the way for equality for all,” said Theresa Pierno, president and CEO for the National Parks Conservation Association, in a recent statement. “When you explore the new visitor center, you’re learning from and honoring those courageous people. Stonewall will continue to inspire for generations and we’re proud to work to help ensure our national parks include diverse, inclusive stories that welcome and represent the people that shaped our nation.”
The bar became a national monument in 2016 under the Obama administration. Shortly after, LGBTQ advocacy group PrideLive secured the lease to the long vacant 51 Christopher Street part of the historic location and transformed it into the center it is today.
The center – organized by two queer women of color, PrideLive’s Diana Rodriguez and Ann Marie Gothard – hopes to serve as a living monument to those who have shaped the LGBTQ equality movement.
It has visual art displays and a dedicated theater space, with the hopes of growing even larger to tell more Stonewall stories. Segal in particular hopes to see further discussions about the intersectionality of the LGBTQ liberation movement and its connections to other movements for equality and civil rights.
“We’re intertwined with history, but people have made us invisible,” said Segal.
He said he’s seen backlash against the community throughout his lifetime whenever there is progress. This latest rise in anti-LGBTQ sentiment in the U.S. — particularly anti-transgender sentiment — is not shocking to him.
“We’re not going to be invisible ever again,” he added.
The center’s jukebox, the same model as the one that was previously housed in the original Stonewall Inn, plays the same songs that would have been played at the time. It gives Segal chills.
“I’ll stand back and I’ll close my eyes and I will almost dream of myself being back there,” said Segal.
He continued, “Please don’t be mournful. Be cheerful, because what happened [in the LGBTQ equality movement] got us to where we are today. So we should be somewhat celebratory. I know some of us didn’t make it. But we’re in a better place thanks to those people.”
(NEW YORK) — President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump met for a showdown over policy and their records, but not everything claimed by the candidates onstage was factual.
Inflation rates, border crossings, Jan. 6, abortion, the stock market and the cost to America of the Paris Climate Accord were among the issues the two sparred over that need a closer look.
ABC News’ politics team analyzed their comments to break down fact from fiction.
Did Biden inherit 9% inflation?
TRUMP CLAIM: “He also said he inherited 9% inflation — no. He inherited almost no inflation, and it stayed … stayed that way for 14 months, and it blew up under his leadership …”
FACT CHECK: This is mostly true. In January 2021, when Biden was inaugurated, year-over-year inflation was about 1.4%. Under Biden, year-over-year inflation peaked at 9.1 % in June 2022. But it is now down to 3.3 %. Under Trump, inflation rose 7.76 % from January 2017 to January 2021, and year-over-year inflation peaked at 2.9 % in July 2018.
–Zunaira Zaki
Were there any military conflicts during Trump’s term in office?
TRUMP CLAIM: “We got…a lot of credit for the military, and no wars and so many other things. Everything was rocking good.”
FACT CHECK: Needs context. While it’s true that Trump did not formally declare war against a foreign power while in the White House, he significantly scaled up military action in Syria and Iraq in the fight against ISIS and also authorized the air strike that killed Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, putting the country on the brink of a direct conflict with Iran. Pentagon records also show that at least 65 American troops were killed in action during Trump’s term.
–Shannon Kingston
Crime and the Border
TRUMP CLAIM: “We have a border that’s the most dangerous place anywhere in the world, considered the most dangerous place anywhere in the world, and he opened it up, and these killers are coming into our country, and they are raping and killing women.”
FACT-CHECK: False. The reality is that no evidence points to a significant surge in crime caused by recent arrivals. The former president’s claims ignore the fact that, overall, crime is down across the country. According to the latest FBI statistics released quarterly, violent crimes were down 6% in quarter 4 of 2023 (through Dec 2023) compared to the same time frame in 2022. There was a 13% decline in murders and a 4% drop in property crimes across the country. That declining trend followed unprecedented spikes in 2019 and 2020, Trump’s last two years in office.
–Armando Tonatiuh Torres-García
Hunter Biden’s laptop
TRUMP CLAIM: “It’s the same thing — 51 intelligence agents said that the laptop was Russian disinformation. It wasn’t that — it came from his son, Hunter. It wasn’t Russia.”
FACT CHECK: True, but needs unpacking At the final presidential debate of the 2020 cycle, Joe Biden suggested the contents of his son’s laptop’s hard drive — which by then had been dubbed the “laptop from hell” in the New York Post and other conservative outlets — were “garbage” and a “Russian plant.”
Biden’s claim that the laptop hard drive was a “Russian plant” was an apparent reference to a letter signed by 51 retired intelligence officials who wrote that the timing of its emergence “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
Several of those signees have since said that Biden mischaracterized the language in their letter.
Furthermore, earlier this month, prosecutors at Hunter Biden’s criminal trial in Delaware introduced the laptop into evidence and, in one of the more theatrical moments of the trial, showed jurors the physical MacBook Pro 13 that Hunter Biden purportedly abandoned at a Wilmington computer repair shop in April 2019.
“Ultimately, in examining that laptop, were investigators able to confirm that it was Hunter Biden’s laptop?” prosecutor Derek Hines asked an FBI agent who testified as an expert witness in Hunter Biden’s recent gun case.
“Yes,” the FBI agent said.
–Lucien Bruggeman
Late-term abortions
TRUMP’S CLAIM: “The problem they have is they are radical because they will take the life of a child in the eighth month, the ninth month and even after birth.”
FACT CHECK: This is not true. Abortions that occur later in pregnancy are around 1% of abortions, according to KFF. Democrats do not call for abortions late into pregnancies, and infanticide is illegal in the U.S. Democrats often respond that abortions that do happen in the third trimester are the result of tragic circumstances in a pregnancy.
–Cheyenne Haslett
Who had a better stock market?
TRUMP CLAIM: “[Biden] created mandates. That was a disaster for our country but other than that we had, we had given back a country where the stock market actually was higher than pre-COVID, and nobody thought that was even possible.
FACT CHECK: Unclear. The Dow hit 30,000 for the first time on November 24, 2020. But that was after the last presidential election, so it’s hard to say whether it was because of Trump’s presidency or because of Biden’s win.
–Zunaira Zaki
Are more terrorists now crossing the border into America?
TRUMP CLAIM: “We have the largest number of terrorists coming into our country right now.”
FACT CHECK: Largely exaggerated. Trump appears to be referring to the increasing number of migrants on the federal terror “watchlist” who are encountered at the border. The number of people encountered by border authorities on the watchlist jumped from three in Trump’s last full year to nearly 100 in the first full fiscal year under Biden. However, the Terrorist Screening Dataset, maintained by the FBI, includes names of people who have suspected ties to individuals who may be affiliated with a foreign terror organization. It is not a comprehensive list of actual terrorists.
–Quinn Owen
Paris Climate Accord
TRUMP CLAIM: “The Paris Accord was going to cost us a trillion dollars and China nothing and Russia nothing, and India nothing. It was a rip-off of the United States, and I ended it because I didn’t want to waste that money because they treated us horribly.”
FACT CHECK: Not entirely true. Biden rejoined the Paris Climate Accord on his first day in office, according to a State Department memo. One-hundred and ninety-six countries signed on to the Paris Accord, agreeing to work together to limit the impacts of climate change and global warming. As part of that, the more developed, wealthier nations committed to contributing $100 billion to support developing countries more vulnerable to climate change’s impacts.
Biden pledged to work with Congress to authorize $11 billion to contribute to the Paris Agreement’s $100 billion in funds to support developing countries who need help adapting to climate change’s impacts. As of 2023, the U.S. was on track to meet that goal with $9.5 billion committed to financing global climate initiatives, according to the State Department.
–Stephanie Ebbs
National Guardsmen on Jan. 6
TRUMP CLAIM: “I offered her [House Speaker Nancy Pelosi] 10,000 soldiers who are National Guard. And she turned them down, and the mayor of – in writing, by the way, the mayor, in writing, turned it down. The mayor of D.C. They turned it down. I offered 10,000 because I could see I had virtually nothing to do. They asked me to go make a speech.”
FACT-CHECK: False. The final report by the bipartisan Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol determined there was “no evidence” to support the claim that Trump gave an order “to have 10,000 troops ready for January 6th.”
The report quoted President Trump’s Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, who directly refuted this claim under oath, saying, “There was no direct order from the President” to put 10,000 troops to be on the ready for January 6th.
Instead, the report noted that when Trump referenced that number of troops, it was not to protect the Capitol but that he had “floated the idea of having 10,000 National Guardsmen deployed to protect him and his supporters from any supposed threats by left-wing counter-protesters.”
–Luis Martinez
Iran, Israel, and Oct. 7
TRUMP CLAIM: “He [Putin] never would have invaded Ukraine, never, just like Israel would have never been invaded in a million years by Hamas. You know why? Because Iran was broke with me. I wouldn’t let anybody do business with them. They ran out of money. They were broke. They had no money for Hamas. They had no money for anything, no money for terror. That’s why you had no terror at all during my administration.”
FACT CHECK: Not true. Iran has been Hamas’ principal backer for decades, including through the Trump presidency. Although Trump did withdraw from an Obama-era nuclear deal and levy sanctions against Tehran that dealt a sharp blow to its economy, records retrieved from inside Gaza by the Israeli Defense Forces and verified by independent news outlets indicate Iran still funneled tens of millions of dollars to Hamas during his administration. Two of Trump’s top advisers for Middle Eastern affairs also claimed that Iran was supplying Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups with $100 million each year in an op-ed published in 2019.
–Shannon Kingston
Trump’s Manhattan hush-money case
TRUMP CLAIM: “That was a case that was started, and … they moved a high-ranking official, a DOJ, into the Manhattan DA’s office to start that case. … [Biden] basically went after his political opponent because he thought it was going to damage me.”
FACT CHECK: There are a few things to unpack here – but there is no evidence to support either statement.
First, there is no evidence that Joe Biden, as president of the United States, directed or choreographed a state prosecution — which was brought by the Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg. Biden has no authority to do so, and there is no evidence to support Trump’s assertion.
Second, with regard to the “high-ranking” DOJ official who Trump claims was moved into the District Attorney’s office to “start the case,” Trump appears to be referring to Matthew Colangelo, who left the Justice Department in December of 2022, years after the investigation began. There is no evidence that Biden or the Justice Department coordinated Colangelo’s move. The case was brought by Bragg, an elected Democrat in New York.
Trump was found guilty by a jury of his peers.
–Lucien Bruggeman
Were tax cuts under Trump the largest in history?
TRUMP CLAIM: “I gave you the largest tax cut in history. I also gave you the largest regulation cut in history, that’s why we had all the jobs.”
FACT-CHECK: False. According to Erica York at the Tax Foundation, the Trump-era tax cut (TCJA) was a large tax cut but not the largest in history. If you look at percent of revenue as share of GDP in the first two years, several tax cuts going back to 1940 were larger. The most recent that was larger was the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012.Separately, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that the tax cuts under President Ronald Reagan were the largest tax cuts in recent history as a percent of GDP.
At the time the law went into effect, the Tax Foundation estimated that it would boost long-term employment by more than 300,000 jobs. But Moody’s Chief Economist Mark Zandi says, “the tax cuts did support job growth, but at the cost of adding approximately $2 trillion to the nation’s debt.” He added, “The regulatory changes had no measurable impact on job growth.”
Joe Biden, 2020 Democratic presidential nominee, right, and President Donald Trump speak during the U.S. presidential debate at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, Oct. 22, 2020. — Kevin Dietsch/UPI/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are scheduled to square off again on the debate stage in September.
ABC News will host the Sept. 10 debate, with World News Tonight anchor David Muir and ABC News Live Prime anchor Linsey Davis serving as moderators.
More information on the debate, including the rules, location, staging and format, will be revealed closer to the date.
The ABC News qualifications for debate include receiving at least 15% in four separate national polls of registered or likely voters that meet ABC’s standards for reporting, appearing on a sufficient number of state ballots to reach the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidency prior to the eligibility deadline, and agreeing to accept the rules and format of the debate.
ABC News’ offices previously hosted two debates in 1960 between then-Vice President Richard Nixon and then-Sen. John F. Kennedy. The first was a split-screen televised debate on Oct. 13, 1960, filmed at ABC News’ New York and Los Angeles studios. Another debate between Kennedy and Nixon took place at ABC News’ New York studios on Oct. 21, 1960.
(DES MOINES, Iowa) — Health experts are warning of the possibility of floodwaters containing “fecal soup” after an agriculture-heavy region in Iowa was inundated with an unprecedented amount of precipitation.
Torrential rain began falling in the Midwest last week, prompting road closures, evacuation orders, helicopter rescues and failure at some water treatment plants, according to officials.
But as the floodwaters fail to recede — and more rain on the way threatens to extend the flood event — residents in several counties in northwest Iowa are being advised to find alternative water sources, as the precipitation likely caused overflows or breaches in the manure storage basins designed to contain the waste produced by the millions of farm animals within the region’s agriculture industry, Alicia Vasto, director of water programs for the Iowa Environmental Council, told ABC News.
The five counties most affected by the floodwaters and at most risk of being contaminated with fecal soup — animal feces mixed with water — are Clay, Emmet, Lyon, Plymouth, and Sioux, according to officials. The region is known for its heavy agricultural industry, the ample manure from which is now contaminating the standing water even further, according to a statement by Food and Water Watch, and environmental watchdog group.
The affected counties are home to more than 900 factory farms that produce about 23.6 billion pounds of animal waste annually — 175 times the human waste that is produced in all five counties, according to the group. The region has a high concentration of animal feeding operations, and the manure is stored in basins or lagoons that can be overtopped when too much rain falls in too little time, Vasto said.
“A lot of these facilities that have these large manure storage systems, and there’s a lot of potential for water contamination,” Vasto said.
The floodwaters have breached manure pits and lagoons, flushing animal feces and urine — as well as bacteria, parasites, viruses and nitrates — into waterways that supply the region’s drinking water, the environmental group said.
The rain fell fast and furiously. Precipitation that began on June 21 measured at 15 inches in some regions just two days later, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynold told reporters on Sunday. President Joe Biden declared a state of emergency in Iowa on Monday.
The severe weather continued into Tuesday night, with more tornado warnings, flash flooding and large hail affecting the Midwest.
Since then, floodwaters contaminated with fecal soup have been flowing into people’s homes as well as the waterways, Vasto said.
“It’s creating this disgusting mess that will be really difficult to clean up and is really toxic and dangerous for folks,” she said.
Health experts are even more concerned about the water systems since the floodwaters have not yet receded, Vasto said. Human fecal matter is likely in the mix as well, since water treatment plants failed and untreated raw sewage is flowing into waterways, she added.
Not only is the drinking water not safe, but neither is swimming or boating in the lakes and rivers in northern Iowa, where runoff from the fecal soup has likely spread, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources said in a press release on Thursday.
Humans who come into contact with or consume manure-contaminated flood water are at increased risk of contracting waterborne illnesses, including E. coli infections and Giardia infections, according to Food and Water Watch. Drinking nitrate contaminated water is linked to birth defects and several types of cancers, the group said.
Residents affected by the floodwaters “must remain on constant guard against the threat of animal waste,” Amanda Starbuck, director of Food and Water Watch, said in a statement.
Elsewhere in the state, floodwaters that spilled over the Big Sioux River levee near Sioux City, Iowa, damaged hundreds of homes and have prompted the local wastewater treatment plant to dump about a million gallons of untreated sewage per day into the Missouri River, The Associated Press reported.
Northwest Iowa was not the only region affected by the heavy rain. Nebraska, South Dakota and Minnesota — where the Rapidan Dam on the Blue Earth River is at risk of failure — have been under siege from severe flooding as well.
The flooding was so severe that a home teetering on the edge of the riverbank collapsed into the rising waters, images show.
This is not the first time fecal soup has affected northwest Iowa. In 2018, flooding caused manure overflows at 28 livestock operations. When Hurricane Florence struck eastern North Carolina in 2018, the flooding caused dozens of manure lagoons to overflow or breach entirely and flood fecal soup into homes and neighborhoods, according to Food and Water Watch. Thousands of hogs died in that event as well, the watchdog group said.
In the long term, the industry will need to rely on much larger manure storage systems that can handle the amount of precipitation that fell in the past week, Vasto said. In addition, lawmakers must start regulating pollution from the agriculture agency, Starbuck said.
“It takes more than disaster declarations to keep Iowans safe,” Starbuck said.
Former president Donald Trump and President Joe Biden participate in the first presidential debate of the 2024 elections at CNN’s studios in Atlanta, Ga on Thursday, June 27, 2024. (Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
(ATLANTA) — President Joe Biden delivered a halting performance in Thursday’s debate with former President Donald Trump — raising new questions about his future in an event largely viewed as a test of the two candidates’ fitness for office.
The two debated a slate of policies on stage in Atlanta, though little new ground was broken. Much of the focus was instead on how the 81-year-old president and his 78-year-old predecessor would handle another four years in the Oval Office — with Democrats left worrying about Biden’s performance.
Here are five takeaways from Thursday night’s clash:
Biden has slow start
Biden came on stage with a raspy voice and repeatedly stumbled through some of his answers early on.
When asked a question on the national debt, he said there are “thousands of trillionaires” before correcting himself, for instance.
But perhaps his biggest stumble came about 12 minutes into the debate, when he paused for six seconds after discussing ways the country could have spent money provided by taxes on wealthy Americans that would have been accrued were it not for tax cuts passed by Trump during his term.
“We’d be able to help make sure that all those things we need to do, child care, elder care, making sure that we continue to strengthen our health care system. Making sure that we’re able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I’ve been able to do with the — with the COVID, excuse me — dealing with everything we have to do with, look … we finally beat Medicare,” Biden said, appearing to lose his train of thought at the end of his answer.
The moment precisely highlighted a major theme heading into the debate — Biden’s mental acuity and fitness for office — and sent Republicans celebrating.
“Game over!!!” Bryan Lanza, a former Trump campaign aide who remains in touch with the former president’s current team, texted ABC News.
Democrats, too, sounded a negative note.
“A few words the Biden team should look up: espresso; and honey and lemon for the throat,” said one high-level Democratic strategist.
Biden appeared to pick up steam as the debate dragged on, dubbing Trump a “convicted felon” and mixing it up over their records, but the president’s performance was less energetic than that of his opponent.
Biden team spins his performance
Biden’s team quickly worked to spin is performance, seemingly recognizing that he likely did not present himself a Democrats had hoped.
The campaign said the president had a cold, but tested negative for COVID-19, though it’s unclear why that news wasn’t announced beforehand. The campaign told ABC News’ Mary Bruce that they’re feeling fine but conceded he had a slow start.
“Tonight, President Biden presented a positive and winning vision for the future of America — one in which every American has a fair shot at the American dream, where every one of our rights are protected, and where our president fights to strengthen our democracy — not to tear it down,” said Biden campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon.
Biden’s allies echoed past support for the president, allowing that the night likely did not go as planned but that the president will remain the nominee.
“I don’t care, I’m going to stick with Joe Biden,” former Democratic National Committee chair Donna Brazile said on ABC News Live.
Trump (mostly) keeps his cool
Operatives were eyeing which version of Trump would appear on stage Thursday: the brawler who repeatedly interrupted Biden at their first 2020 debate? Or would he be a staid presence that would be interpreted as more presidential?
Largely, the latter ended up as a more apt description of Trump’s performance.
To be certain, Trump veered into some of his more bombastic rhetoric — exaggerating the state of the economy under his term and the number of border crossings and crimes taking place under Biden; saying Biden “could be a convicted felon”; and accusing the president of “going after his political opponent because he can’t win fair and square.”
But he did not center his arguments around unfounded claims of election fraud or repeated attacks on Hunter Biden, the president’s only surviving son who was recently convicted on felony gun charges. Oftentimes, he returned his answers to favorable topics for him like inflation and immigration, including on a question regarding the Jan. 6 riot on Capitol Hill.
“Let me tell you about Jan. 6. On Jan. 6, we had a great border. Nobody coming through. Very few on Jan. 6. We were energy independent on Jan. 6, we had the lowest taxes ever. We had the lowest regulations ever,” he said.
Trump’s campaign swiftly declared victory.
“Tonight President Trump delivered the greatest debate performance and victory in history to the largest voter audience in history, making clear exactly how he will improve the lives of every American,” top Trump campaign hands Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles said in a statement.
“Joe Biden on the other hand showed exactly why he deserves to be fired,” they said. “Despite taking a week-long vacation at Camp David to prepare for the debate, Biden was unable to defend his disastrous record on the economy and the border.”
New rules impose cleaner debate, but less pushback
Thursday’s debate had novel rules that were largely successful in imposing a cleaner debate than in the past.
No audience was in the studio to interrupt with applause or boos, and microphones were cut off when candidates were not recognized to speak.
The result was a debate with little crosstalk or disruptions, a stark departure from primary debates earlier this year and debates during 2020, when crosstalk made the candidates’ comments essentially illegible.
However, while the more rigid format helped move the conversation along, there was minimal pushback from moderators Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, who at times opted to move forward rather than correct falsehoods or push for a direct answer to their initial question if a candidate had already used up their time for a response.
And the conversation still veered into the outlandish at times, with both candidates sparring for a few minutes toward the end over their golfing abilities.
“Let’s not act like children,” Trump said.
Lots of policy talk, but little new ground
The structure also helped the moderators and candidates stick to policy, but little new ground was broken on the contenders’ stances on main issues.
Biden vowed to reinstate Roe v. Wade and protect abortion rights, raise taxes on wealthy Americans and support Ukraine.
Trump defended his tax cuts, said he would force European allies to boost their own efforts to back Ukraine in its fight against Russia and declared that Israel should be able to continue its military operations in Gaza.
However, voters will be left with little new information about what the two candidates believe on key issues that they haven’t heard on the campaign trail.
The historic bathhouse on Jacob Riis Beach is undergoing $50 million renovations that have stoked concerns about gentrification on the working class, queer beach. — ABC News
(NEW YORK) — The summer season in New York City is informally marked each year by the hoisting of Pride flags on The People’s Beach, a queer haven tucked away on the far eastern corner of the city’s Jacob Riis Park in Queens.
“When I was a runaway, when I had no community at all, I came and I witnessed something that I never even knew existed: that was a sense of family,” said Ceyenne Doroshow, activist and founder of LGBTQ advocacy group GLITS. “People fed me, people dressed me.”
This has been a popular gathering place for the LGBTQ+ community since the 1940s, shaped by its beachgoers into more than just a spot to sunbathe and swim. It’s a place of direct and indirect social activism, where queer joy is at the heart of the jumble of music, umbrella and bodies packed tightly along the shoreline each weekend.
But the land directly surrounding the beach is drastically and quickly changing. The recent demolition of an abandoned building, a $50 million building restoration plan and erosion threaten the future of this safe haven, some activists and beachgoers told ABC News.
Beachgoers are concerned it could become the next in a long list of lost LGBTQ+ spaces across the nation.
“This fight is bigger than just me. It’s bigger than just us. It’s about us fighting for our space in New York City,” Doroshow said. “This is considered our Mecca. This is our Fire Island, our Hamptons, our Boca Raton — this is the place where we can celebrate this as a space where you don’t have to [spend] out of your pocket to celebrate life.”
Gentrification inches toward The People’s Beach
The People’s Beach was once shielded from the rest of the world by the hulking Neponsit Beach Hospital, which was opened in the early 1900s. Local beachgoers say it acted as a barrier between queer beachgoers and any disapproving, discriminatory glares from beyond the park’s boundaries.
Even when the building had blocked the beach from view, the NYC LGBT Historic Site Project found that queer beachgoers long reported being harassed and given citations by Parks law enforcement for violations such as men’s bathing shorts being too short.
In 2023, NYC Health + Hospitals demolished the building, leaving the beachfront barren and open to the gawking eyes of all nearby. The loss of the seemingly protective barrier is a reminder of those historical tensions, and has stoked concerns about increased surveillance over the area.
The demolition came hand-in-hand with the announcement that the nearby historic park bathhouse about a quarter of a mile away would undergo a $50 million restoration, with plans to revitalize the landmark with restaurants, a bar, pool, event spaces and 28 hotel rooms.
Beachgoers fear a high-end restoration will ushering in a new era of gentrification on a beach known for its economic accessibility, pushing out lower-income and queer beachgoers.
“I want to make sure that the beach is accessible for the poor and working class of New York to come,” Berntsen said. “It would be great if we could build more of this infrastructure to the beach. My hope is that it’s not at the cost of it being an accessible beach financially to the people that go there.”
However, the National Park Service said it’s excited for the renovation: “The Bathhouse is emblematic of over half a century of the quintessential NYC seaside experience,” said Jen Nersesian, the NPS superintendent of Gateway National Recreation Area, in the 2023 announcement.
She continued, “Its restoration will connect beachgoers with this heritage and provide a new suite of visitor opportunities for generations to come.”
All of this is happening as erosion causes closures on parts of the beach — including the main strip of The People’s Beach where the LGBTQ community is known to gather on Bay 1 and 2.
In 2023, the NPS placed about 360,000 yards of sand on the beach. One year later, much of the sand has since been washed away due to intensifying weather conditions, creating unsafe conditions for beachgoers.
Some feel as though the beach is both literally and figuratively being pulled from under them.
“The problem really becomes about the uneven development,” said Jah Elyse Sayers, founder of research and archival group The People’s Riisearch Group at CUNY. “Whatever erosion will be naturally happening, it’s not also accompanied by the usual accretion of sand … Our literal beach is shrinking. The building that really defined the space and held the space is gone.”
The National Park Service, which manages the park, has not yet responded to ABC News requests for comment on beachgoer concerns.
Taking care of their own
Historical marginalization has routinely forced the LGBTQ+ community to take matters into their own hands — a trend reflected in the actions being taken by Riis beachgoers.
“It’s queer to take care of each other,” said Gabriel DeFazio, a Jacob Riis beachgoer who has helped raise funds to improve the beach.
Local activists say they are raising money and have gathered more than 6,000 signatures to form a community land trust on the empty, former Neponsit Beach Hospital lot right in front of the queer part of the beach.
The soon-to-be renovated bathhouse is far enough away that it provides little benefit for LGBTQ beachgoers on the eastern side, who only have a single food stand and a handful of porta potties despite the beach’s popularity.
Instead, they hope to build a health and wellness community center with a focus on the LGBTQ+ community in the hospital lot that offers services like therapy and hosts essential beach functions like bathrooms, changing rooms and food vendors.
“People need to feel that they have some self-determination and a place where they can go and celebrate community and develop the rules that they feel are appropriate to govern both their actions and the use of the land and their relationship to this overall environment,” said Petr Stand, a leader at Project Abigail, which designs sustainable solutions to gentrification.
The People’s Beach also didn’t have a wheelchair accessibility mat or extra wheelchairs available for beachgoers, hindering the ability for some patrons to get on the beach. Within 24 hours of asking the LGBTQ community of beachgoers, advocates say the funds were raised to buy these materials.
“We deserve concession stands. We deserve all the accommodations, we’ve had to create our own safety around wheelchairs,” Doroshow said. “That’s community taking care of community.”
Project Abigail, GLITS and urban planning, design and development nonprofit Hester Street are working together to create a plan for the center and other community initiatives around policing, wellness, and more.
Amron Lee, a project associate at Hester Street said a community policing strategy with trainings on de-escalation and harm reduction can will address some of the expected tensions that may come with new developments: “What you start to see, when that happens in any space is more surveillance, more harassment, maybe different populations, or different groups of people being in much more tension with each other.”
NYC Health + Hospitals told ABC News that “engagement with City partners on the future of the site beyond the current lifeguard complex remains ongoing,” but did not respond to requests for comment on the community’s involvement in future plans.
A world without The People’s Beach
Sayers, who grew up by the beach in South Jersey, didn’t think they would feel comfortable on the beach after coming out as trans. That changed when they came to Riis beach.
“I got out here and immediately could see just other visibly trans people, people who didn’t seem to care how their gender was being perceived. People all different kinds of bodies, like shirtless, not shirtless, like tiny bottoms, big bottom, whatever, just like people were wearing whatever, doing whatever talking, playing,” Sayers said.
Slowly, they went from going to the beach in a tank top and long shorts to feeling comfortable in beachwear once again. They felt at home alongside the Riis community — a feeling they hope can one day extend beyond Bay 1 and 2 for the LGBTQ+ community.
“I would love for this beach to feel less important, but that would require that we felt safe everywhere,” said Sayers. “If there’s a safe space, it also means that there are unsafe spaces.”
Berntsen is staying positive amid the developments, focusing on the community’s historical ability to stand strong against change.
“This has been a space of joy and liberation, long before then,” said Berntsen. “Witnessing the shifting landscapes, both literally, because of climate change, and social and economic landscapes of Rockaway over the last 20 years, I felt it’s really important for the community to understand that this is a community that can withstand these changes.”
To do so, Sayers urges community members to keep coming despite concerns.
“The only reason we’re able to be here is because people came here. Another reason people will be able to continue coming here is if we keep coming here,” Sayers said.
