Houston residents protest as crews remove rainbow crosswalks from city street

Houston residents have protested as construction crews removed two rainbow crosswalks from an intersection in the Montrose neighborhood.

Crews began working on the removal at around 2:30 a.m. local time Monday and had replaced the bright colors with fresh asphalt by sunrise, according to local CBS affiliate KHOU 11.

Dozens of protesters gathered near the intersection early Monday morning, KHOU 11 reported. Several were moved to the sidewalks as barricades were installed to prevent them from entering the roadway, according to Fox 26 Houston.

Houston police told The Independent four people were arrested for blocking the roadway. Authorities said charges against them are pending but would not specify which charges.

The rainbow crosswalk removal comes after Governor Greg Abbott directed the Texas Department of Transportation earlier this month to ensure counties and cities “remove any and all political ideologies from our streets.”

“To keep Texans moving safely and free from distraction, we must maintain a safe and consistent transportation network across Texas,” Abbott said in an October 8 press release.

He threatened to withhold or deny state and federal road funding if cities did not comply.

Protester Ethan Hale explained the significance of the rainbow crosswalks.

“This is a memorial for someone who was killed in a hit-and-run,” he told KHOU 11. “This is more than just the LGBT community.”

Other protesters argued the crosswalk removal was just a distraction and a waste of “time and money.”

“We know we have some of the worst air quality, we have people disappearing in the bayous, we have urgent matters that need to be attended to, and we are wasting time on a distraction and a vilification of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans people,” Andy Escobar told KHOU 11.

Brenda Franco told the outlet while holding up a transgender rights sign, “This is just a distraction. We are wasting time and money.”

Houston isn’t the first city to see its rainbow crosswalks vanish. In August, the rainbow crosswalk honoring the 49 victims of the deadly 2016 Pulse Nightclub shooting was removed from an Orlando street.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said, “We will not allow our state roads to be commandeered for political purposes,” in an X post at the time.

In July, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy urged governors in a letter to support a national SAFE ROADS initiative to help “eliminate distractions” on roadways.

Duffy noted traffic deaths in 2024 decreased 3.8 percent from the year before, but said, “We still have more work to do.”

While Duffy’s letter didn’t explicitly say the initiative includes the removal of rainbow crosswalks, he said as much in a follow-up X post.

“Taxpayers expect their dollars to fund safe streets, not rainbow crosswalks,” the secretary said. “Political banners have no place on public roads. I’m reminding recipients of @USDOT roadway funding that it’s limited to features advancing safety, and nothing else. It’s that simple.”