Long Beach Pride, the organization behind the Southern California city’s annual Pride celebration, shared images on Saturday of hateful graffiti scrawled across a city utility box on the sidewalk in front of its headquarters.

The incendiary language, along with a swastika and a call to “#stopbeingquietMAGA!” was drawn sometime on Saturday, according to Long Beach Mayor Rex Richardson, who denounced the hateful messaging in a post to X.

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The graffiti is “not just an attack on a symbol, but an attack on our LGBTQ+ family, friends, and neighbors,” Richardson said. “This vile act of hate has absolutely no place in Long Beach.”

“To our LGBTQ+ residents and families: I want you to know that you are valued, loved, and respected,” Richardson’s post said. “You are an essential part of our city, and we will always fight for your right to live openly, proudly, and with the same dignity that every person deserves.”

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Scrawled across one side of the large electrical box, the screed in black pencil or crayon read, “F**k gay trans lesbos queers, All should die! F**k tr**nys, Protect REAL kids. #stopbeingquietMAGA!”

Another side featured a Nazi swastika and the words, “I hate f*gs.”

On a third side, the vandal declared, “F*ck f***ots, Go to hell!”

Richardson said that the city’s graffiti-removal team was sent to remove the vandalism and that Long Beach police were investigating the incident. 

Elsa Martinez, interim president of Long Beach Pride, shared a statement from the organization in the aftermath. 

“This is deeply concerning,” she said. “Acts of hate are not something we expect to see in our own front yard, in a city like ours — one where we have fought for decades to be seen, accepted and embraced as equal members of this community.”

Martinez also asked for grace for the perpetrator.

“I want to be clear,” Martinez added. “We do not respond with fear or hate toward those who commit such acts. Instead, we hold them in love, trusting that love has the power to dissolve the fear and ignorance that fuels hatred. We ask our community to join us in this spirit—because only love can drive out fear.”

Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn joined Martinez and the Long Beach mayor in condemning the violent rhetoric and committed $2,500 to Long Beach Pride to upgrade and expand their security camera system. 

“This was not just vandalism—it was a threat meant to terrorize the LGBTQ community,” a statement from Hahn read. “My hope is that these security upgrades will give staff, volunteers, and community members peace of mind as they continue their important work.”

Last month, Hahn made an identical commitment to the Mi SELA youth center in the city of Bell, which is north of Long Beach, after the Latino LGBTQ+ youth center was serially attacked with bags of dog poop lobbed at their building.

“The fact that this person is going out of their way to do this says everything about them and nothing about our LGBTQ community in Southeast L.A.,” Hahn said at the time.

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