Hundreds of young people gathered on the lawn of the Vermont Statehouse on Friday as part of a nationwide series of events to build support for transgender rights amid what they denounced as an increasingly hostile climate.

Sing, we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it!” Many draped themselves in pride flags or carried posters with messages like Yay gay or Protect trans kids.

Young people, some as young as high school, stood in front of the crowd and talked about their struggles with their sexuality at a time when many people across the country refuse to acknowledge them.

Charlie Draugh, 17, a senior from Chicago, Minn.

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who attends boarding school in Vermont said he was angry that groups are trying to control his life and make him a political pawn he is not.

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My life is not your debate, Draugh said. It’s not a political issue. I’m not hurting anyone and I’m certainly not hurting myself.

The rallies dubbed Transgender Day of Visibility come as Republican lawmakers in the US this year pursued hundreds of proposals to push back LGBTQ+ rights, particularly rights for transgender residents, including banning trans girls from girls’ sports, refusing to admit trans people allow using restrooms in accordance with their gender identity and require schools to dead-name trans students—that is, require them to be identified by the name they were given at birth.

Have at least 11 states

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Enacted laws restricting or prohibiting gender affirmative care for minors: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee, Utah, South Dakota, and West Virginia. While federal judges have blocked enforcement of laws in Alabama and Arkansas, nearly two dozen states are considering bills this year to restrict or ban healthcare.

In North Dakota, the Senate voted Thursday to override a veto from the Republican government. Doug Burgum of a bill that would generally prohibit public school teachers and staff from referring to transgender students with pronouns other than those that reflect the gender they were assigned at birth. It is unclear whether the North Dakota House will also vote to override the veto.

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On Friday, President Biden issued a statement in support of Transgender Day of Visibility. The president said transgender Americans deserve to be safe and supported in every community. He denounced what he called hundreds of hateful and extreme state laws targeting transgender children and their families.

Let me be clear: These attacks are un-American and must come to an end, Biden’s statement said. The bullying, discrimination and political attacks that trans children face have exacerbated our national mental health crisis.

Vermont was the first state in the country to pass a law allowing civil unions for same-sex couples and to pass one of the first same-sex marriage laws. It is known for being generally welcoming to the LGBTQ+ community. A number of Vermont Capitol police officers monitored the rally in Montpelier, but there were no problems and the rally gradually began to disperse about an hour after it began.