Jay Katari

Introduction

Jay Katari is a Utah-based entrepreneur and investor whose two-week stint on the board of equalpride — the parent company of LGBTQ magazines and outlets including The Advocate, Out, and Them — ended in resignation after editorial staff erupted over his social-media history of support for Donald Trump. A freelance journalist’s posts surfaced a photo of Katari wearing a red “Trump” and “Keep America Great” hat, and within a day of the outlets’ editors publicly demanding answers about his role, equalpride CEO Mark Berryhill announced Katari’s departure in an email to employees. Katari says he never intended to cause disruption in “a community I hold dear.”

Background Information

Equalpride has owned The Advocate, Out, Pride.com, Out Traveler and Plus since 2022 and acquired Them, the trans-focused outlet, in February 2026; the company had laid off journalists and editors at The Advocate, Out and Pride.com shortly before that acquisition. Katari joined through an unusual channel: under the company’s investment agreements, its lead investor group could appoint two directors without CEO or management approval, and Katari came in through that process. He was listed as a board member and “Strategic Advisor, Growth Innovation” on equalpride’s leadership team, a role the website described as focused on expanding reach, strengthening commercial partnerships, and developing recurring revenue.

On August 31, 2026, CEO Mark Berryhill emailed employees that he had “full confidence in Jay” and encouraged staff to prioritize meetings with him. Katari, according to company biographical material cited in news reports, is a serial entrepreneur with multiple businesses centered on autism and helping people with disabilities; he was born in Canada and moved to Florida for high school and college. State campaign-finance records compiled by OpenSecrets show he previously donated $10,000 to former Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes and $2,000 to Kentucky politician Christopher Thieneman.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Allegations. The claims in this section are allegations from reporting by freelance journalist Kevin Ortega-Rojas and from statements by equalpride editorial staff, who said his documented social-media activity conflicted with the company’s mission. Nothing here involves any criminal charge or court proceeding, and nothing was adjudicated. Katari has not denied the posts; he responded that his intention was to volunteer his time to support the company’s work, and a New York Post review found no explicit anti-LGBTQ sentiments in his social-media profiles.

The fallout began when Ortega-Rojas, a freelance writer and podcaster who formerly worked as a rapid-response reporter for GLAAD and hosted The Advocate Weekly podcast, reported that Katari had been quietly added to the board and scoured his social-media history. He surfaced an image posted to Facebook in May 2024 showing Katari in the red Trump hat alongside three men on a balcony, and flagged that Katari followed Trump family members including Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Lara Trump and Ivanka Trump, plus a fan account. Ortega-Rojas also pointed to posts appearing to bash former President Joe Biden and a bio listing pronouns as “dude/bro/guy/man/Jedi,” which was seen as mocking the practice of listing preferred pronouns. The Washington Blade reported his Instagram showed posts of him wearing Trump MAGA-branded merchandise.

The findings infuriated editorial staff across equalpride’s newsrooms, who went to leadership to ask about his role. On September 14, 2026, the editors of The Advocate, Out, Them, Pride.com, Out Traveler and Plus posted a joint Instagram statement saying their editors had become aware of “concerning reports” about Katari that morning. The editorial team later said in a statement to The Advocate: “As a small team of queer and trans journalists, we were deeply concerned by reports that an equalpride board member had a history of expressing support for Donald Trump and his MAGA agenda on social media… Given this administration’s attacks on the LGBTQ+ community, it was immediately clear to us that his involvement with the company was untenable.”

Public Reaction and Consequences

The consequence was his job: on Tuesday afternoon, September 15, 2026, Berryhill announced Katari’s departure from the board in an email to employees, one day after the editors’ joint statement. Katari’s name and biography were scrubbed from equalpride’s website shortly afterward, and the investor appointment agreement that had placed him on the board was ended, with the investor group giving Berryhill authority over future appointments. The editorial teams publicly applauded the resignation in their statement to The Advocate.

Katari, in a statement shared by Berryhill, said he had “decided to step down from the Board of Directors of equalpride” and “never intended for my involvement to cause disruption within a community I hold dear and deeply respect,” adding that his “intention was simply to volunteer my time and experience to support the incredible team and the important work they do for the LGBTQ+ community.” The story drew coverage from LGBTQ press and mainstream outlets alike, with the New York Post framing it under the headline “Gay media empire forced out board member over MAGA hat” when it picked the story up on September 23.

Current Status

As of September 23, 2026, Katari is no longer on equalpride’s board, his name has been removed from the company’s site, and the investor-group appointment mechanism that put him there has been discontinued. The company did not publicly detail any further action, and Katari’s own businesses — focused on autism and disability services — were not reported to be affected. He has made no further public statements beyond his resignation statement.

Impact on Their Career/Life

Katari’s public identity is now attached to one of the more stark examples of political-expression blowback in media governance: a businessman with no record of public anti-LGBTQ statements, per the Post’s review, pushed out of an LGBTQ media company within roughly two weeks of joining its board, after staff treated his support for Trump as irreconcilable with its mission. For equalpride, the episode forced an unusual public concession — the end of the investor appointment channel — and left its editorial teams visibly at odds with their own corporate leadership, having forced out a director their CEO had publicly vouched for less than three weeks earlier.

Sources

• New York Post, “Equalpride board member resigns after staff pushback over Trump hat,” September 23, 2026. source
• Washington Blade, “Advocate, Out parent company adds Trump supporter to board, prompting outrage,” September 15, 2026. source
• PinkNews, “Equalpride board member resigns over reported MAGA links,” September 16, 2026. source
• X post by @nypost announcing the story, September 23, 2026. source