Bob Harvie’s commission dispensed a $13,500-grant for transporting youth to the Rainbow Room
Democratic House candidate Bob Harvie (Pa.), a county commissioner in Pennsylvania, oversees a local fund that distributes millions of dollars his county received as part of a settlement with opioid manufacturers. While the money is supposed to go toward “Prevention, Treatment and Recovery” services, Harvie used some of it to transport kids as young as 14 to an “LGBTQ-youth” center that offers “medical transition” seminars.
The Bucks County, Pa., Board of Commissioners, which Harvie chairs, approved a $13,500-grant in December to Planned Parenthood Keystone for “Expanding Services and Transportation” to the Rainbow Room, a local center that caters to gay and trans youth. The grant was used to transport high school students to Rainbow Room functions, the Delaware Valley Journal reported earlier this year. Its funding came from the county’s Opioid Settlement Fund, which is due to receive $70 million from drug distributors and pharmacy chains over the next 18 years.
Rainbow Room functions include seminars like “SEX ED NIGHT / MASTURBATION,” which the center held in May 2024. A pamphlet advertising the event shows a photo of a woman’s hand massaging a watermelon designed to represent the female anatomy. In 2023, the Rainbow Room hosted a “Queer Prom,” where attendees as young as 13 were given goody bags with condoms, lubricant, and dental dams, used to prevent the transmission of sexually transmitted diseases during oral sex.
Earlier this week, meanwhile, the center held a “translating transition” seminar meant to teach kids as young as 14 “the basics of transgender identities, social transition, medical transition, and more!” In 2020, it hosted representatives of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Gender Clinic to discuss “transition issues for trans kids.” The hospital has faced intense scrutiny for providing hormone treatments like puberty blockers to young trans children, and for performing “gender-reassignment” procedures, more commonly known as sex-change operations.
That could raise questions for Harvie, the top Democratic candidate running to unseat Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R., Pa.). Former vice president Kamala Harris beat President Donald Trump by 1 point in the district last year, but Fitzpatrick won his race by 10 points. Democrats placed the race on their “Districts in Play” watchlist, signaling the party believes it can flip the seat next year. Harvie faced national scrutiny last year after he and a fellow Democratic Bucks County commissioner voted to defy Pennsylvania state law to count invalid mail-in ballots during a recount for the U.S. Senate race.
In 2022, Harvie formed the Bucks Opioid Settlement Advisory Committee to distribute the millions of dollars the county received as part of the settlement with major opioid manufacturers. The money is meant to provide “Prevention, Treatment and Recovery” services to county residents, according to the Bucks County website.
The Rainbow Room’s sexually explicit programming has been a hot-button issue for years in Bucks County, a northern suburb of Philadelphia. In addition to local news coverage of its controversial activities, state senator Doug Mastriano (R.) proposed a bill in 2023 to classify drag shows as an “adult oriented business” after learning the Rainbow Room hosted a drag show for children.
In 2021, a Rainbow Room initiative called Roy G Biv, which caters to children between 10 and 14 years old, hosted a “Drag Queen story time” featuring four drag queens and “a craft table for all of the kids!”
Roy G Biv will hold a seminar later this week about “The Spectrum of Asexuality,” and in June held an event called “Queer Tarot Night.”
Harvie has worked closely with the Rainbow Room before. In 2023, Harvie, donning a rainbow tie, hosted an event to commemorate gay pride month with Marlene Pray, the Rainbow Room director who provided the condom-filled goody bags for the organization’s Queer Prom.
Harvie’s allies have also tapped taxpayer money to fund the Rainbow Room.
In November 2022, state senator Steve Santarsiero (D.), who has endorsed Harvie for Congress, announced $630,000 in state funding would be allocated to the Rainbow Room to open a second facility in Bucks County.
Harvie’s campaign, the Bucks County commissioners’ office, and the Rainbow Room did not respond to requests for comment.
