DragFest, Stanford Drag Troupe’s annual drag festival, has lost the majority of its funding following the discontinuation of the neighborhood system. Plans for the 2026 DragFest are still underway, but organizers said they face significant hurdles in staging an event comparable to previous years.
In past years, DragFest was funded by the neighborhood system. After the neighborhood system’s cancellation this year, many neighborhood events such as DragFest no longer have a large budget. The first DragFest was held in May 2022 and featured drag queens DeJa Skye and Bosco, stars from season 14 of “RuPaul’s Drag Race.”
“It hit us all like a truck,” said Arin Iverson ’27, co-president of Stanford Drag Troupe. “I think DragFest is the event of the year for us at Drag Troupe, and people look forward to it, and I also think that it’s a really important event for queer visibility and community on campus.”
Iverson initially did not realize that the loss of the neighborhood system meant the loss of funding for DragFest, which he estimated was $150,000. The University said that the event is not being discontinued but revised.
“Students are encouraged to seek funding for events they feel strongly about continuing through other sources, including the Stanford Fund Partnership Program and Associated Students of Stanford University (ASSU),” wrote director of media relations Luisa Rapport in an email to the Daily. “Student leaders are working on developing a new vision for what [DragFest] will look like.”
Iverson appreciates the efforts of the Stanford community to help DragFest. According to Iverson, Arbor Live, a student-run production company, has offered the Drag Troupe stage lights and sound equipment.
Aditya Indla ’27 has attended DragFest since his freshman year. For Indla, the event was “a culmination of accepting a part of myself.” Indla sees the loss of DragFest as not just a loss for the Stanford community but for the queer community as a whole, which he identifies with.
“There are people on this campus who aren’t able to really be who they truly are at home because of this nationwide backslide,” Indla said. “[DragFest] is one of those times where you really get to see queer performers on stage just being proud of who they are.”
Indla described the loss of funding as unfortunate for performers, who spend hours practicing routines, as well as for audience members.
“I think it’s truly an incredible loss for the performers themselves, and for all of the people in the audience who are able to see people like themselves,” Indla said.
Iverson said he is in conversation with ASSU and the Office of Student Engagement to obtain increased funds. The Drag Troupe organizers plan to hold DragFest even with a smaller budget, though it may mean the loss of drag queen headliners such as 2025’s Peaches Christ. Stanford Drag Troupe also plans to continue their quarterly shows with student performers.
“Our quarterly shows are pretty small,” Iverson said. “We don’t get quite the audience because we don’t have headliners. It’s just student performers. People come to DragFest for the big visuals, the big headliners. It’s really cool to see a lot of our performers blossom in that context.”
Iverson said more than a thousand people had signed up for the 2025 DragFest on EventBrite.
“It’s really incredible to see this many people turn out for queer culture and drag,” Iverson said. “It’s something that’s quite near and dear to my experience of queerness, and also to see our performers get a chance to perform at something this large.”
Indla hopes to get involved with fundraising for DragFest, so that people can continue to have the opportunity to “be themselves” and feel proud.
“Seeing [DragFest] in person is just truly a different experience, realizing that they’re people just like we are, and I think it’s a demonstration of that inherent humanity within all of us,” Indla said. “They can share the same physical space as us and we can get to exist the same way that performers of all gender identities do.”