Rose Montoya Briefly Bared Chest at White House
The trans woman influencer posted a video on instagram that included a few seconds of footage of herself bare chested. She has been banned from future events at the White House.
by Evan Urquhart
a stock image we’re using to give a sense of the scale of nudity Montoya showed off in her video
At a Pride event on the White House lawn on Saturday a transgender model and social media influencer, Rose Montoya, took video of herself meeting the president, partying on the lawn with other members of the LGBTQ+ community, and flashing her bare chest at the camera (albeit covering her breasts with her hands), next to two topless trans men.
The footage of the topless stunt took up about 3 seconds of the longer montage video, which ran a little less than a minute. In the footage, Montoya’s breasts remain covered by her hands, which she uses to jiggle them. One of the trans men can be heard saying “Are we really topless at the White House?”
The video montage was posted to Instagram by Montoya on Monday, June 12. It’s unclear when the provocative 3 second stunt first came to the notice of the far right, but it had been posted to Twitter by conservative activist and talk show host Charlie Kirk by yesterday evening, and Kirk’s post seems to pre-date other notice on that website.
Multiple outlets are reporting that a spokesperson for the Biden administration called the display “inappropriate and disrespectful” and that Montoya and the trans men who participated will be barred from any future events at the White House.
A large number of right-wing outlets have covered the story thus far including three seperate stories in the New York Post, three stories in the Daily Mail, coverage on the anti-woke sports blog Outkick, another three stories on Fox News’ website, and many others. Celebrity gossip sites such as TMZ have also picked up the story. Many have included quotes condemning the behavior by conservatives, a few have included response from members of the LGBTQ+ community, and all seem in agreement with the Biden administration that this was inappropriate and disrespectful. Some LGBTQ+ community members have also expressed the sentiment that Montoya has harmed trans people and/or the cause of transgender rights with her behavior.
In a year when an unconstitutonal and discriminatory assault on the rights of trans people has swept through red state legislatures it seems unlike that this topless stunt could possibly make things worse for transgender people in America. However, if the treatment of Dylan Mulvaney (who never actually did anything) is any guide, we may be hearing about Montoya from right wing scolds for quite a while.
UPDATE 6/16/2023: On Friday, Montoya posted a video to her instagram account in which she apologized to the queer community as well as to the president, the White House, and her friends and family for her behavior, which she described as “a moment of trans joy” that she now recognized as having caused harm to the community.