Pride Month is upon us, folks. This year, however, the overtures are less in-your-face than in years past. Both The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal have reported that numerous corporate sponsors have pulled out, scaled back, or otherwise opted to be silent supporters of Pride Month 2025 activities.
One particularly interesting company is Anheuser-Busch InBev, which opted out of its usual sponsorship of St. Louis PrideFest this year for the first time in more than three decades. One cannot help but think that Bud Light’s parent company is wary after the boycott it incited in 2023.
Another company that’s more muted (though that’s not saying much) is Target. This company also knows better than most the consequences of pushing unwanted values on its customers. In 2022, Target decided to market chest binders and packing underwear to children. Then, in 2023, it teamed up with a collaborator who peddled transgender/Satanic clothing. Target was clocked pretty hard by moms who were sick of the corporation allowing these items to be sold and promoted in its stores. On the Target website this year, the top ad is for Father’s Day; “Pride” is much further down the page. However, Target remains a platinum sponsor of NYC’s Pride Parade. Target has set the bar pretty low, though this year is certainly an improvement.
Other companies that have not experienced a public boycott, like Mastercard, Nissan, PepsiCo, and Citi, have pulled their funding and/or scaled back on their corporate support of Pride events.
Why this change of heart? Did they finally realize that giving money to Pride festivals — many of which are deviant — is bad for the culture at large?
Don’t bet on it. These are corporations. They are only interested in the bottom line, and they have seen what happens when you push average Americans too far with Rainbow Mafia-themed propaganda.
Most companies, when asked, explained that there were two reasons for their muted Pride Month support. First, they cited the inability to budget due to the unpredictability of President Donald Trump’s tariffs on goods. Suzanne Ford, executive director of San Francisco Pride, argued that this is just a cop out: “They’re framing it as a budgetary limitation, and I do understand there’s some truth in there. But budgeting is about values.” Yes, budgeting is about values, and companies value their bottom line above everything else.
Second, companies told Pride event organizers that they don’t want to get in trouble with this administration’s crackdown on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). The Trump administration rightly argues that DEI limits opportunities for those most qualified and is a civil rights violation. Supporting Pride activities is considered a part of DEI initiatives in the workplace — which is something corporations did to themselves. Had they not pandered to left-wing social values, this wouldn’t need to be a consideration.
“Many Americans don’t care what people do in private,” notes political commentator Gary Bauer. “But they want it to stay private. They are sick and tired of being told we have to celebrate it. The number of days, weeks, and months dedicated to celebrating ‘pride,’ which is a sin, is absurd.”
All in all, this year’s Pride malaise feels like a victory of sorts on the culture front. It would be nice to walk into stores every June and have Father’s Day and the importance of male leaders in the family be the main cultural holiday again.
