
Only one U.S. state has a majority that opposes marriage equality, another has the highest concentration of LGBTQ+-identified people, and a majority of Republicans agree that transgender people deserve the same rights and protections as other Americans, according to a newly released 50-state survey conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI).
PRRI interviewed more than 22,000 adults nationwide throughout the last year as part of its American Values Atlas. The findings provide a snapshot of how individual states and demographic groups view same-sex marriage, anti-discrimination protections, and trans rights at a time when all of those are under attack from Christian nationalist forces.
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The survey revealed the two U.S. states with the lowest levels of support for same-sex marriage: Only 47% of respondents from Mississippi support same-sex marriage with Arkansas close behind at 50%. Conversely, the highest levels of support for same-sex marriage were expressed by 85% of respondents from Massachusetts and the same amount Rhode Island, with the 81% of respondents from Vermont close behind.
The survey asked respondents whether they self-identified as LGBTQ. It found that 17% of respondents in Nevada self-identified as LGBTQ — the highest percentage of all U.S. states, followed by 14% of respondents in Maine, Nebraska, and Wyoming.
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The states with the lowest percentage of self-identified LGBTQ respondents were Hawaii and South Dakota, with just 5% each. Kansas was the state with the second-lowest number of self-identified LGBT respondents, with just 6%.

Among states whose respondents voiced the highest level of support for nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people were Massachusetts (85%), Maryland (82%), and Alaska (81%). However, Mississippi (60%), Wyoming (57%), and Arkansas (53%) showed the lowest support for such protections.
States with the most respondents opposed to religiously based ant-LGBTQ+ service refusals were Massachusetts (72%), Hawaii (71%), Vermont (71%), and Connecticut (70%). Conversely, only 44% of West Virginia respondents voiced opposition to such refusals — the lowest percentage among all U.S. states.
Interestingly, the poll found that seven in 10 Americans (71%) agreed that “transgender people deserve the same rights and protections as other Americans,” including most Democrats (88%), independents (77%), and Republicans (57%). This is especially surprising, seeing as the Republican Party and its president have spent the last decade vilifying trans people as mentally ill and a danger to the privacy and safety of women, girls, and children.
PRRI’s survey also looked at LGBTQ+ attitudes in relation to Christian nationalism. It found that Christian nationalism rejecters (91%) were the most likely to support LGBTQ+ nondiscrimination protections, followed by 77% of skeptics, 61% of sympathizers, and 42% of adherents of Christian nationalism.
Unsurprisingly, adherents and sympathizers of Christian nationalism were less likely to support same-sex marriage and less likely to oppose religiously based refusals for LGBTQ+ people, compared to respondents who either reject or are skeptical of Christian nationalism.
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