Coming Out Republican
A History of the Gay Right
Neil J. Young
For more than fifty years, gay Republicans have been a small but significant constituency for the party and some of its most enthusiastic activists, remaining loyal even as its platform has embraced evangelical Christian resistance to gay rights. And closeted gay Republicans have held influential positions in Republican administrations ever since Reagan. But they have been more than just good foot soldiers – their activism has been instrumental in creating the party of Trump.
Coming Out Republican: A History of the Gay Right follows the gay men and women who, in the 1970s, from the boardrooms of Southern California and the bathhouses of San Francisco, mobilized an unexpected political movement dedicated to personal freedom and the right to be left alone. A diverse band of gay Republicans from small business owners, entrepreneurs, and military officers to leather daddies, drag queens, and bathhouse regulars – waged battles both at the ballot box and inside the GOP with the hopes of throwing Democrats out of office and homophobes out of their party.
They would not succeed at both. But even as their hopes of having a moderating influence on the party faded, gay Republicans adapted. And rather than leaving the party, many of them doubled down, sharpening the GOP’s far-right edge and helping to shape the modern Republican party. The compromises and calculations that gay Republicans made, and the embattled identity they cultivated, give us a new way of understanding the improbable rise of Trump and the conflicting currents that animate the GOP today.
Forthcoming from University of Chicago Press
Praise for Coming Out Republican
Coming Out Republican is an incredible achievement: an astonishing work of history that makes a deeply compelling argument for the ways in which ‘Gay Republicans’ have wielded power to serve white male interests. If you’ve ever wondered why, or how, a gay person could be a Republican—this book has the complicated answers.—Anne Helen Petersen, author of Can’t Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation
In this deeply researched and deftly written history, Young offers a nuanced account of the politics and personalities of LGBTQ Republicans. Coming Out Republican is an absolute must-read.—Kevin M. Kruse, Princeton University
Young’s nuanced history shows that gay Republicans, far from being monolithic, have included scoundrels and hypocrites, but also American heroes; kooks and fanatics, but also complex thinkers whose ideas have brought LGBTQ people closer to equality. Coming Out Republican is a wonderfully compelling read.—Lillian Faderman, author of The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle
You can’t understand either the modern history of the Republican Party or the emergence of the gay-rights movement without appreciating how they have played off one another for nearly a half-century. Young has written a fascinating account of gay Republicans, an underrecognized force who have shaped both their party and LGBT politics. —Sasha Issenberg, author of The Engagement: America’s Quarter-Century Struggle Over Same-Sex Marriage
