Austin Pride fest kicks off this weekend

Austin Pride kicks off this weekend, bringing hundreds of thousands of attendees downtown for the city's annual festival and parade.

Why it matters: Austin's Pride festival celebrates the growing number of Texans who identify as LGBTQ+, and organizers estimate more than 200,000 people attend each year.

The intrigue: Austin holds its Pride festival and parade in August each year, rather than June like many cities.

• Organizers say it avoids competition, allowing them to bring in more renowned entertainers and visitors from across the country. Rapper Saucy Santana will headline this year's festival, along with Mariah Balenciaga, Isabella Lovestory, Arya, Salina EsTitties, Kerri Colby and Adore Delano.
• An August event also brings in more student volunteers, who have returned to Austin for the school year, Austin Pride Foundation organizers say.

Driving the news: The festival starts at 11am Saturday at Fiesta Gardens, followed by the parade at 8pm at the Capitol.

• This year's Pride theme is "Queer Cabaret," and organizers have encouraged attendees to wear sparkling gowns, bedazzled suits or drag looks.
• Festival tickets are available for $20, and the festival will feature inflatable games, carnival rides, dozens of food and drink vendors and a drag queen story time. Entry for kids aged 7-17 goes for $10 apiece.
• The parade, which begins at the Capitol and runs down Congress Avenue before concluding at the Ann W. Richards Congress Avenue Bridge, is free and open to the public.

Between the lines: Texas has long been a hostile state for LGBTQ+ rights , and Austin Pride comes amid the possibility that the U.S. Supreme Court could reconsider its opinions on protecting same-sex relationships.

• Texas led the nation in proposed anti-transgender legislation last year, even if few of those bills became law .
• The Legislature won't meet again until January.

By the numbers: Same-sex married couples in the state have increased substantially since the Supreme Court's 2015 decision that made the marriages legal.

• About 1.8 million Texans identify as LGBTQ+, per a 2022 analysis of census data by the Public Policy Institute of California that studied only those four identities.
• Roughly 100,000 people in the greater Austin metro identify as LGBTQ+, according to a 2021 city report , the latest data available.

📍 If you go: Expect road closures in the area Saturday. The festival is located at 2101 Jesse E. Segovia St.