Orlando residents have resisted Gov. Ron DeSantis and state officials’ policy by repainting a rainbow crosswalk outside the Pulse nightclub memorial, just hours after it was removed under a federal directive backed by President Donald Trump’s administration, Newsweek reported.
Community members and LGBTQ+ advocates gathered at the site of the 2016 mass shooting, where 49 people were killed, to recreate the crosswalk in chalk and paint after crews stripped away the rainbow colors overnight. The removal was carried out following a directive from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who instructed governors last month to eliminate decorative crosswalks and other “distractions” on public roads.
“While this attack was meant to demoralize us and push us back in the closet, Orlando refused to be erased,” Democratic state Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith told Newsweek. Smith, who became the first openly gay Latino elected to the Florida legislature in 2016, called the governor’s actions a “cowardly abuse of power.”
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