LGBTQ+ crisis hotlines are available to connect with throughout the country.
Following the results of the 2024 election, the Rainbow Youth Project, a national LGBTQ+ crisis help center, which typically receives slightly under 3,700 calls a month, has already surpassed that number in just the past six days, As one of many call centers that cater to LGBTQ+ teens and adolescents, they are not alone in seeing the increase in volume.
Across the United States, crisis lines and organizations like the Rainbow Project and The Trevor Project are seeing the spike.
The Trevor Project, a group focused on the prevention of suicide among LGBTQ+ youth, is said to have seen a 125 count increase in calls, texts and chat messages just on Election Day and the following Wednesday. Onelowa, another group that works with the LGBTQ+ community in that region, also has cited a jump in messages to their social media as well as emails from concerned citizens.
At the center of these calls, prompting the understandable panic, are many of the policies revealed in the months before the election. That includes anti-LGBTQ+ legislation nationwide, and closer to home, laws like South Carolina’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender youth.
Much of what comes from Project 2025, written by the extremist right wing organization Heritage Foundation, has been largely accepted by Republicans. Many are fearful it will be enacted with the start of the second Trump presidency. For a lot of people in our community, that spells danger for LGBTQ+ folks everywhere.
GLSEN, an organization which focuses on creating safe and inclusive spaces for LGBTQ+ youth, expressed immediate caution at the idea of protections like Title IX being done away with. Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, GLSEN’s executive director, put into words after the results of the 2024 election what Project 2025 could expose LGBTQ+ youth to. “The threat posed by Project 2025 is real and immediate,” they stated. “This plan seeks to undermine Title IX protections, removing vital safeguards that ensure the safety and well-being of LGBTQ+ youth.”
The fearful response to the Trump victory was clearly evident the day after the Trump Campaign announced its victory.
In a report from The Washington Post, a 17-year-old Trans teen from Raleigh, North Carolina, spoke under the condition of anonymity. Fearful of potential violence because of their gender identity, they said threats and comments from other high-schoolers began the moment they got on their school bus the morning after the election. “As soon as I got on, one kid said, ‘Are you scared? You should be.’ Later I heard a classmate say, ‘I find most gay people annoying, and I hope Trump coming to power will solve this problem.’”
Even after lodging a complaint with administration over the comments, the harassment continued. “At school, all year, kids have been threatening to hurt me when Trump wins, and now that moment is here. I’m feeling really overwhelmed and worried about myself, my family and my country.”
Also in the interview from the Washington Post, Lance Preston, the executive director of the Rainbow Youth Project, confirmed he had heard quite a bit already while fielding his share of calls.
Three days before the election, a call came through from a nonbinary-identifying 16-year-old teen, describing a pact made with three other queer youths; the members would commit a “group suicide” if Donald Trump won the election.
Thankfully, a case manager was able to intervene, chatting with the high-schooler and helping them realize the situation was one they didn’t want to follow through with.
Teens aren’t the only worried parties using these lines, according to Preston. About a quarter of the calls have been coming from middle aged folks and seniors, which confirms an increase from the eight percent reaching out to express a growing sense of loneliness and isolation. In addition to concerns about losing access to gender-affirming care and being physically harmed by someone because of their gender identity or sexual orientation, they’re expressing anxiety about the welfare of children and grandchildren.
While the suicide pact exposed in the call to the Rainbow Youth Project was prevented, Preston said he hasn’t been able to shake the effect the call had on him.
“I keep thinking,” he said, “what if that one teenager had not called us?”