A brief post titled “Pride & Resistance”, published by the Cascade Forward Project, frames recent organizing as both a protest of federal policy and a moment to celebrate LGBTQ+ community members within the group’s network.

The entry, posted on Cascade Forward Project’s website, includes a photo and a caption stating that “this week” the group “didn’t just protest” a “laundry list of grievances with the federal government,” but also “took time to celebrate our LGBTQ+ members, in our 50501 family and the greater community.”

While the post does not specify where the gathering took place, the Cascade Forward Project brands itself as a Southwest Washington–focused effort, and its updates often circulate among organizers and residents in the broader Lower Columbia region—including Cowlitz County.

For local readers, the significance is less about the specifics of one event (which the post doesn’t fully detail) and more about what it signals: grassroots groups are explicitly linking opposition to federal power with visible solidarity for queer and trans neighbors. In a climate where LGBTQ+ people are routinely targeted by culture-war rhetoric and policy, that choice—publicly centering LGBTQ+ members while mobilizing politically—matters.

It’s also a reminder that “community safety” isn’t only about policing and prosecutions. It’s about whether people can show up in public without being treated as a threat—whether at a rally, a community meeting, or simply existing openly in towns like Longview and Kelso.

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