(Photo courtesy the National Trans Visibility March.)
Trans leaders from across Florida have spent months planning and fundraising for a trip that they say is about more than a march.
In October, members of the Florida Trans in Collaboration will join the 2026 National Trans Visibility March in Puerto Rico, standing in solidarity with the island’s transgender community, highlighting the power of collective action and creating space to celebrate trans joy.
The march, which first began in Washington, D.C. in 2019, has since become a platform for transgender people and allies to come together around visibility, advocacy and community.
Ashunte Coleman, one of the original ambassadors of the National Trans Visibility March, remembers when the idea for a national march was first taking shape in 2018.
After a transgender woman was killed in Atlanta, Coleman says that community members organized a local march. She and others began discussing what it could look like to bring that same sense of visibility and collective action to a national stage.
Now, at a time when trans Floridians are facing increased scrutiny, restrictions surrounding identification and anti-trans legislation, local leaders in Central Florida say the need to advocate for trans visibility has never been greater.
First targeting drag story hours and books, Coleman says politicians pivoted to demonizing trans people as a wedge issue “America was sore about” to build campaigns and stay in office by attacking the trans community.
“Whereas the rest of the world is convinced to live their lives under certain guidelines, we don’t, and people don’t like that, Coleman says. For Mulan Williams, a trans community leader based in Central Florida, this year’s march represents an opportunity for transgender people to come together.
“Right now we are being put under the microscope with everything that the government is putting out about us and all the different laws,” Williams says. “Almost every day we’re being dehumanized.”
Williams is also the founder of Divas and Dialogue, a grassroots support group for trans women of color. She and several other community leaders are part of a network of local and statewide trans-led organizations that have come together under the Florida Trans in Collaboration collective.
Williams says the collaboration was formed after she and other local trans leaders realized that they could accomplish more by working together than separately.
Over the past two years, this partnership has allowed several trans-led organizations across the state to provide safety trainings, health initiatives, housing support and advocacy efforts, in attempts to make a difference in the lives of trans Floridians.
That same spirit of collaboration is now being applied to getting community leaders to this year’s Trans Visibility March in Puerto Rico.
Williams says that collecting the funds to make the trip to Puerto Rico possible has been one of the biggest challenges.
Their final push comes Oct. 13, when the coalition is hosting a fundraiser at the Renaissance Theatre Company’s gala to help cover travel costs for people who otherwise might not have the opportunity to attend.
“We’re trying to get around 25 people there to show them unity, love and show them what it looks like when trans leaders come together,” Williams says.
But the trip is about more than getting to the march itself.
Ashley Figueroa, executive director for the Gender Advancement Project, says the march offers something that can be difficult to find in the current political climate.
“You’re not just having a discussion to strategize or to discuss what’s happening legislatively, but it’s a moment to just celebrate trans joy, to be together, and to reinforce that we’re here and we’re not going anywhere, and our existence does matter,” Figueroa says.
Despite being a dedicated space for trans individuals, Figueroa says the intention behind the march is not to separate the trans community from the broader LGBTQ+ community. Instead, she sees it as an opportunity to highlight the issues uniquely affecting transgender people while inviting allies and the broader community to stand alongside them.
“When you think about where the [LGBTQ+] movement started, the focus was on gay individuals,” Figueroa says. “Now it’s the transgender community who’s having to fight. It is a time for the trans community to have their own space and for the rest of the LGBT community to stand with the transgender community because right now it is us that are the target.”
Figueroa says that her U.S. passport, which reflected her name and female gender since 2017, was changed back to “M” after she renewed it this year. As a trans woman, she says this not only undermines her identity but outs her in ways that can invite discrimination and even danger when traveling.
For Figueroa, who is from Puerto Rico herself, the location of the march is also deeply personal. She says that traveling to the island is an opportunity to support the its trans community, while highlighting the work already being done there.
“Supporting the community there is really crucial,” Fugueroa says, “especially in the times that the Puerto Rican government is trying to mimic a lot of the Trump agenda that’s happening with all the anti-trans legislation.”
Regina Livingston, one of the organizers of the march, says the decision to bring the march to Puerto Rico was partly about giving greater visibility to a community that has not previously been the focus of the national event.
Puerto Rico has its own transgender advocates and organizations, including Puerto Rico Trans Latina, which has been involved with the National Trans Visibility March since its early days, Livingston says.
“What’s special about this march is we’re covering an area that has never been the focal point,” Livingston says. “The people that are in Puerto Rico that haven’t felt like they’ve had a voice, that haven’t felt like they could be their authentic self.”
Pointing to their ongoing water crisis and governmental corruption, Yasmine (Barbie) Prosper, executive director of Trans United in Elevation, says hosting the march on the island is a way for the community to show up for Puerto Rico. Prosper sees the trip as an opportunity to build solidarity between Black and Brown communities.
“Right now, there is a big push for division between the Black and Brown communities,” Prosper says. “If nothing else, this shows that we are able to work in unison with each other to achieve a greater goal, which is to bring light and shed light on the things that are happening within our community.”
For more information, visit NationalTVM.org.
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