Florida’s state tourism agency is taking heat after it quietly took down its LGBTQ+ travel content from its official website.
The ‘LGBTQ Travel’ section disappeared from the Visit Florida site before the summer.
According to internet archive searches using the ‘wayback machine’ it was last on the site in April.
The Sunshine State is a major destination for LGBTQ travelers, despite several years of anti-LGBTQ policies pushed through by Governor Ron DeSantis.
Key West and Fort Lauderdale are among top destinations for LGBTQ travelers.
“It’s just disgusting to see this,” says Keith Blackburn, of the Greater Fort Lauderdale LGBT Chamber of Commerce.
“They seem to want to erase us.”
The change on the website was first reported by NBC.
Visit Florida is a public-private tourism agency allocated funding by the state.
Last year civil rights groups issued a travel advisory for Florida, saying DeSantis’ stance over the ‘don’t say gay’ issue and opposition to CRT made the state ‘openly hostile’ towards LGBTQ individuals and black travelers.
However, it had little impact as the state has continued to welcome a record numbers of tourists.
So far there has been no official response from Visit Florida or state officials in Tallahassee.