In a landmark moment for LGBTQIA+ advocacy, U.S. civil rights organisation Lambda Legal has announced the creation of a record-breaking $285 million legal fighting fund, aimed at protecting and advancing queer rights amid increasing conservative efforts to roll them back.
The campaign, titled “Unstoppable Future”, is now believed to be the largest fundraising initiative in history dedicated to LGBTQIA+ legal advocacy.
“With this campaign, the LGBTQ+ community and our allies have said to our opponents: ‘We will not go back,’” Lambda Legal CEO Kevin Jennings told The Advocate last week.
Notably, 95 per cent of the contributions came from individual donors, not corporations, foundations, or law firms. The largest single donation totalled $25 million, with 17 other individuals contributing $1 million or more.
Jennings said the campaign reflects a grassroots determination to protect LGBTQIA+ rights during what should be Donald Trump’s final presidential term. “We’ve lost control of two of three branches of government — the executive and the legislative,” he warned. “The only hope now is the judicial branch.”
The newly secured funds will be used to expand Lambda Legal’s legal team from 36 to 51 attorneys and to support legal aid and education programs. The group is currently engaged in six lawsuits against the Trump administration, with more actions planned.
The fundraising achievement comes in the same week the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S., passed a resolution urging the repeal of same-sex marriage across the country. The resolution called for “laws that affirm marriage between one man and one woman,” including the overturning of the landmark Obergefell v. Hodges decision.
Support for the resolution was so overwhelming at the denomination’s national convention that it passed without debate.
Jennings said the Unstoppable Future fund sends a clear message: the fight for LGBTQIA+ equality is far from over, and the community is more determined than ever to defend its hard-won rights.
