With June 1 marking the first day of Pride Month, about 80,000 gathered in downtown Pittsburgh for the annual parade.

The parade kicked off a month full of events honoring Pride Month, with people from across Pittsburgh and beyond coming to celebrate. First Lady Jill Biden made a surprise visit, briefly speaking in Allegheny Commons Park West.

At the event, Biden addressed recent threats towards LGBTQ+ rights, including book bannings and Florida’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ law.

“In some way, all of you here today have called upon your courage and you used your voice to say, ‘We will not go back,’” Biden said.

Lexi Byrom, a sophomore nursing student at Pitt, attended Pittsburgh Pride for the third year in a row.

“It’s always a very feel-good event,” Byrom said. “Everyone’s coming together. It feels very safe and like a celebration of your identity … There’s not the expectations of the everyday world.”

Byrom said she thought of pride as “being authentically yourself no matter what the situation is.”

“I think it’s a whole way of life,” Byrom said. 

West Mifflin residents Amanda Sorg and Reuben Miller sported matching T-shirts offering “mom hugs” and “dad hugs,” with other attendees also wearing similar variations of the shirt. They wear their shirts to Pride every year. 

“We get a lot of love,” Sorg said. “Last year, we had people getting out of the parade coming over to hug us.”

Miller said they see it as “a chance for people to be who they are and express themselves,” an opportunity that Miller said many in their generation didn’t have.

“Some people haven’t had a chance to get a hug from a parent in a while,” Miller said. “We grew up in a different generation where it wasn’t OK.”

Sam Michael, a resident of Aliquippa, has been attending Pride in Pittsburgh “for years.” She said she plays an active role in the community, formerly serving as the vice president of her college’s Gay-Straight Alliance and volunteering with Pittsburgh organizations, such as the Persad Center. 

“I think it’s really important to support the community because not only am I part of the community, my daughter’s part of the community and my sisters are part of the community,” Michael said. “So it’s one big family in my case.”

Michael said she sees pride as “a chance to celebrate the things that make us the same instead of the things that make us different.”

“I think that Pittsburgh, for a lot of our faults and a lot of rap we get, we’re a very queer-inclusive city,” Michael said. “We have one of the safest prides anywhere. We have a very warm community.”