A transgender model has been banned from the White House after going topless at a Pride event.
Rose Montoya, an activist and trans influencer, was one of hundreds of people invited by Joe Biden to the White House for Pride Month, which is celebrated every June.
Montoya posted clips from the event to her Instagram account, including one where she's standing in front of the White House topless and covering her nipples with her hands.
"I had the honor of attending White House Pride, the largest one in history where the pride flag flew for the first time. This is trans joy. We're here at the white house unapologetically trans, queer, and brown [...]," she captioned the video.
Many people took to the comments section to hit out at Montoya, saying she was being disrespectful, with one person writing: "The level of disrespect is disgusting. You were fine until you went topless. No class or [decorum]."
Someone else added that it was "embarrassing" saying: "You just single handedly set the whole cause many steps backwards. THIS IS NOT PRIDE [...] This is classless and embarrassing. You should take it down."
Following the posting of the video, a White House spokesperson said Tuesday (June 13) that Montoya and the other people in her video would be banned from future events. "This behavior is inappropriate and disrespectful for any event at the White House. It is not reflective of the event we hosted to celebrate LGBTQI+ families or the other hundreds of guests who were in attendance. Individuals in the video will not be invited to future events," they wrote, per NBC.
Montoya has since addressed the drama in a further Instagram video, which she simply captioned: "Free the nipple." In it, she says: "Conservatives are trying to use the video of me topless at the White House to try to call the community groomers, etcetera.
"And I would just like to say that, first of all, going topless in Washington, D.C., is legal, and I fully support the movement in freeing the nipple because why is my chest now deemed inappropriate or illegal when I show it off, however, before coming out as trans it was not?", she added.
She also said that people who criticized her are oversexualizing women's bodies. "My trans masculine friends were showing off their top surgery scars and living in joy, and I wanted to join them. And because it is perfectly within the law in Washington, D.C., I decided to join them and cover my nipples just to play it safe," Montoya said.
"Because I wanted to be fully free and myself. I had zero intention of trying to be vulgar, or be profane in any way. I was simply living in joy, living my truth, and existing in my body. Happy Pride. Free the nipple," she concluded the clip.
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