Chicago Pride Parade announces "Free to Be Proud" as theme for 2026

The Chicago Pride Parade announced its grand marshals and theme for 2026 on Tuesday.

The theme is "Free to Be Proud," which organizes said reclaims the founding purpose of the event — that the freedom to live openly and safely is not guaranteed and must be protected and defended.

"Free to Be Proud is declarative," Tim Frye, longtime parade co-coordinator and vice chair of PRIDEChicago, said in a news release. "It reflects both how far our community has come and the work that remains. Pride has always been about more than celebration — it's about visibility, advocacy, and the pursuit of justice for all."

The theme honors those who paved the way for LGBTQ+ rights, while also speaking to the present moment in which organizers said freedoms face continuing challenges.

Meanwhile, this year's grand marshals are veterans of leadership in the LGBTQ+ community:

• Tracy Baim, cofounder and owner of The Windy City Times newspaper who is also credited with rescuing the Chicago Reader. The journalist and historian has written thousands of articles, columns, and editorials, and has earned multiple lifetime achievement honors, and has authored or edited 14 books on LGBTQ+ history. Baim is also a cofounder of Pride Action Tank and the Illinois LGBT Chamber of Commerce, and serves as executive director of Press Forward Chicago.
• Mona Noriega, a Chicago-born Chicana lesbian and mother of two who now serves on the board of Equality Illinois. Noriega opened the Midwest office of the LGBTQ+ rights law firm Lambda Legal and served as its Midwest director. She also served as commissioner and board chair of Chicago's Commission on Human Relations under mayors Rahm Emanuel and Lori Lightfoot, and as chair of the Illinois Commission on Human Rights from 2021 to 2024.
• Evette Cardona, a Puerto Rican lesbian and native Chicagoan, who retired in May of last year after 2025 from the Polk Bros. Foundation,  a nonprofit dedicated to addressing poverty and ensuring opportunity for Chicagoans. Cardnoa is also a cofounder of Women of All Colors and Cultures Together and Amigas Latinas, and was founding board member of the Center on Halsted.
• The Alliance of Illinois Judges, which serves a mission to defend and advance an independent judiciary and promote respect and unbiased treatment for LGBTQ+ people in the legal system. The AIJ's current president, Judge Jill Rose Quinn, is the first openly transgender judge and elected official in Illinois.

The Chicago Pride Parade started on June 27, 1970, as a march from Bughouse Square at Dearborn and Walton streets to what is now the Daley Center downtown. It was intended to commemorate the uprising at the Stonewall Inn tavern in New York City's Greenwich Village neighborhood a year earlier.

The parade was not officially recognized by the city until Mayor Jane Byrne officially declared the first Gay Pride Parade Day in 1981.

The route has changed many times over the years, but the East Lakeview area has at least been part of it since the second parade in 1971. The parade was not held in 2020 or 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but has been back strong as ever since 2022.

This year's Pride Parade will step off Sunday, June 28, at 11 a.m. The starting point for the past several years has been West Sheridan Road and Broadway — at the spot in East Lakeview where the streets run in place of Byron and Halsted streets, respectively. Viewing begins at Halsted and Grace streets and Broadway.

The parade route heads south on Halsted Street, east on Belmont Avenue, south on Broadway, and east on Diversey Parkway to Sheridan Road/Cannon Drive.