Kelly Clarkson chats with Laverne Cox and LGBTQ+ center CEO: 'It's getting a little scary now'

Laverne Cox on The Kelly Clarkson Show

The musician hosted transgender actor and icon Laverne Cox on Thursday's episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show, alongside Carla Smith, CEO of the LGBT Community Center in New York City.

Kelly Clarkson is using her platform to uplift LGBTQ+ voices as it's "getting a little scary" for queer people in the U.S.

The musician hosted transgender actor and icon Laverne Cox on Thursday's episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show, alongside Carla Smith, CEO of the LGBT Community Center in New York City, to talk about the center's important work serving the LGBTQ+ community in an era under Donald Trump.

"I'm actually the first CEO of color at the center, the first Black CEO," Smith said to applause. "The center really has been designed and set up to provide empowering services to the LGBTQ community, making sure that people have access to safe spaces."

See on Instagram

Smith detailed the center's beginnings in 1983, when it was primarily "working to address issues related to the AIDS epidemic" by "making sure that we could create safe spaces." Smith noted that safe spaces for the LGBTQ+ community "didn't exist back then," prompting Clarkson to interject, "It's getting a little scary now too."

"There's a though line, right? That sort of carries us forward," Smith continued. "And since then, over 40 years we've developed services that are responsive to the needs of the community, we provide mental health services ... we do survivors' support services, substance use services, HIV prevention, and work with youth. Very important services needed more than ever."

Since taking office, Trump has signed executive orders denying the existence of transgender people, banning federal funding for gender-affirming care for those under 19, banning trans athletes from women's sports, and revoking 1960s civil rights protections. Cox noted that "when the state is so vehemently, overtly against you, community feels like the thing that we have to really lean into." She then turned to ask Smith, "How are you finding that at the center and your role in that?"

"We have 100 staff, really dynamic staff members who are also community members and allies to the community," Smith answered. "So we are holding space for people who are struggling and working through that, and making sure that we're taking care of ourselves in the process."