A video of LGBTQ+ activists visiting the White House set off a social media firestorm earlier this week when one transgender female model was briefly shown with her top down on the South Lawn at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Now that model has officially been banned from the premises.
Rose Montoya, an activist and trans model, was part of an event that saw hundreds of LGBTQ+ American citizens invited to the White House to help celebrate Pride Month 2023.
Afterwards, she shared a video clip to her social media accounts showing a montage of footage taken at the event, including a shot that panned across a number of attendees.
In that clip, Montoya is seen with her top off and her hands covering and shaking her bare breasts. A transgender man was also shown with his own shirt off next to Montoya flexing his biceps.
The penalty for Montoya and several others in the video was announced by Press Secretary Karine-Jean Pierre at a Tuesday briefing.
“This behavior is inappropriate and disrespectful for any event at the White House. It is not reflective of the event we hosted to celebrate LGBTQI+ families or the other hundreds of guests who were in attendance,” Pierre said. “Individuals in the video certainly will not be invited to future events.”
After the clip went viral, Montoya posted a response on Twitter.
“I wanted to be fully free in myself," she said in the clip. “I had zero intention of trying to be vulgar or be profane in any way. I was simply living in joy, living my truth and existing in my body. Happy Pride, free the nipple.”
Montoya also said in the clip that before she came out as trans, being shirtless would never have raised an eyebrow.
“All you're doing is affirming that I am a woman,” she said.
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