Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has cracked down on suspected “distractions” for drivers, and is particularly aiming for a rainbow crossing.
In a letter to all 50 governors of Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser, and the former Republican governor, Puerto Rico, he urged them to join the Federal Highways Agency’s “safe arteries for all through reliable operation and distraction strategies.”
The initiative covers non-freeway arterial roads where more than half of U.S. road deaths (often including pedestrians), according to compiled data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Duffy’s letter noted that an estimated 39,345 people died on American roads last year, a 3.8% decline from the previous year, but still “unacceptable.”
“The Safe Roads National Initiative will focus on non-freeway arteries in your state, including safety and operations along intersections and segments, consistent recognizable traffic control devices including crosswalks and intersection markings, and orderly use of street rights that are kept free from distractions.
Duffy asked the state’s Department of Transportation to “develop a list of arterial segments including intersections” to address it by September 30, 2026.
Among the “distractions” that have been allegedly led to accidents and traffic fatalities is the rainbow crossing that Duffy denotes as a “political message.”
“The roads are for safety, not political messages or artwork,” he said in a statement provided to the right-wing news outlet. Daily traffic lights. “I ask governors of every state to ensure that roads, intersections and crosswalks are kept without distractions.”
Duffy did not say that of the 39,345 traffic fatalities in 2024, the rainbow crossing was due to the rainbow crossing.
However, the Secretary of Fatowa against the Rainbow Crosswalks has some basis in past statements from the federal highway administration. In 2011, the FHWA said the art of crossings “is likely to contribute to false sense of security for both drivers and pedestrians, despite its goals for improving safety.”
“Crosswalk art could compromise pedestrian and driver safety by obstructing, damaging or obscuring official traffic management equipment,” the FHA wrote at the time. “This art can also encourage road users, especially bicycles and pedestrians, to participate in the design directly, loiter the streets, or give reasons to not open the streets in a convenient or predictable way.”
The rainbow crossing has celebrated the LGBTQ community pride or recognized the LGBTQ community. This has long sparked social conservatives who often believe that LGBTQ identity should not be publicly recognized or praised.
Both liberal and conservative states, cities across the United States paint rainbow themed designs on crosswalks for a variety of reasons. In 2019, the FHWA ordered the city of Ames, Iowa to remove the rainbow crossing. The city rejected the request, claiming that the Trump administration could not justify the request.
However, if Duffy has his way, LGBTQ-themed artwork will be paved or painted.
Duffy never respected LGBTQ identity. Whether he voted for the Pro-LGBTQ bill in his time in Congress or voted previously as MTV’s 1990s-era reality TV star Boston in the real worldhe repeatedly followed fellow cast member Genesis Moss, out-lesbian, who revealed she was not attracted to him.
In that respect, the demand to eliminate so-called “political” artwork from rainbow crossings and roads appears to be in line with his personal views of the LGBTQ community, as well as efforts by the Trump administration to eliminate so-called “anxious” from the government.
The push to remove rainbow crossings from the roads is consistent with Duffy’s personal views on the LGBTQ community as well as the broader efforts by the Trump administration to avoid perceptions of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender identities.
Rainbow Crosswalks are also targeted by individuals who try to send political messages of disapproval to the LGBTQ community. Last year, Republican teenager Dylan Brewer performed Burnout syndrome At a rainbow-decorated intersection in Delray Beach, Florida. He was ordered to pay $6,000 in damages.
Source: Metro Weekly – www.metroweekly.com
