North Carolina’s chapter of the Human Rights Campaign will be hosting its annual dinner in Charlotte on Feb.10 at the Le Meridien. The event will feature food, a silent auction and remarks from a keynote speaker. Once known as the largest attended dinner in the country, the annual HRC North Carolina dinner is going into its 29th year and serves as the chapter’s largest fundraiser for the year. Check out the link below for ticket information.
The North Carolina Dinner & Silent Auction started in 1995 during a pivotal time for the organization. Then Executive Director Elizabeth Birch led a rebranding effort for the organization that year, changing its name and branding, launching the now uber-popular yellow equal sign on a blue background. Part of the rebranding campaign included starting the annual Carolina Gala.
According to its website, when the Human Rights Campaign Fund (HRCF) was founded in 1980, it was primarily a fund for supporting pro-fairness congressional candidates. The rebranding in 1995 announced to the country that, in the words of Birch, ‘We’re so much more than a fund.’”
The theme for this year’s gala is “Without Exception” and it was announced in early November through the HRC social media pages.
This year’s guest speaker for the HRC North Carolina Dinner & Silent Auction is Pulse Nightclub shooting survivor and LGBTQ+ gun safety advocate Brandon Wolf. Wolf is on the frontline in the fight for LGBTQ+ civil rights and gun safety. In 2019, he became the first survivor of the Pulse tragedy to testify before Congress and returned in 2022 to testify on the rise of anti-LGBTQ hate violence before the House Oversight Committee.
Wolf is also a co-founder of The Dru Project, a nonprofit organization providing resources for safe spaces in schools for LGBTQ+ students and currently serves as National Press Secretary for the Human Rights Campaign.
In an interview with The Guardian, Wolf explained how he and the HRC have been working to fight for LGBTQ+ civil rights in his home state of Florida, where Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and fellow members of his party have continued to pass legislation targeting queer folks.
“It is a scary time to be not just LGBTQ but LGBTQ and Black in this state, and ultimately, that’s the intent,” Wolf explained. “So many of these laws, so much of the rhetoric is about fear, intimidation, bullying a majority of the population into submission so the minority can impose their values on everyone else …
“And quite frankly it is a disgrace to have a governor like Ron DeSantis that makes people look over their shoulders to win political points. It is a disgrace to have someone like that turning his own residents into refugees fleeing to the northeast so they can get access to healthcare [and] send their kids to a school that’s going to treat them with respect.”
As of this article’s posting date (2/1/24), tickets are still available for purchase on the HRC’s website.