LGBT group hosting Bay Shore meeting on Trump election

A local LGBT nonprofit is set to host a town hall meeting Thursday night in Bay Shore to discuss and digest what the election of Donald Trump to be the 45th president of the United States will mean for its communities.

The LGBT Network, a Bay Shore-based lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender nonprofit, encourages all to attend the “We Will Rise Up!” forum scheduled to start at 7 p.m. at the Bay Shore Community Center.

“I know many of us are probably still in shock from the results of last night’s election and trying to figure out what this means for our future,” David Kilmnick, chief executive of the LGBT Network, wrote in an open letter Wednesday that was obtained by Newsday. “Many have called the LGBT Network’s Centers today just to talk with someone on the other end of the phone, and many wept and expressed their fears of the uncertainty ahead.”

Trump “preyed on fear and divisiveness,” Kilmnick wrote, as “his campaign appealed to the worst elements of racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, bigotry and misogyny.”

A spokeswoman for the Trump campaign was not available for comment.

Kilmnick expressed some hope and delivered a message of action in his letter by referencing Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s concession speech, which she delivered Wednesday in Manhattan, and said that participation is by Americans is demanded on a daily basis.

“We have come too far to go back even one inch and we will fight on,” Kilmnick wrote.

Topics to be discussed include safe schools for children, and tips to ensure accurate health and legal information is disseminated throughout the community,

“And we will never back down to hatred, we will stand up and make sure that love always wins,” Kilmnick wrote. “Our movement have faced great challenges before and we have not only survived, we have thrived. And this will be another time we rise up to the challenges facing us and thrive again.”

The LGBT Network’s Bay Shore Community Center is located at 34 Park Ave.