In a gay bar in Brownsville, Texas, drag queens are the reason, plucking like petals lengthwise-folded singles, cheek-kissing regulars, and dazzling everyone with sequins and shine. It’s a Friday night in early January. “Heart of Glass” is playing, and the drink of choice is Dos Equis dressed with chamoy and dusted with Tajín: a red sweet-and-sour paste and a chili-lime powder. I, a writer from out of town, have been warmly welcomed even though between sets I keep asking patrons what they think about SpaceX, the California-based company that has set up its rocket shop and launchpad about 20 miles away.
Kira, in her 20s and here at Bar-B with friends, says she really likes space (she loves sci-fi); she just doesn’t appreciate the gentrification that’s come with it. She wants to move, but can’t find a one-bedroom for less than $800. Stephen, a retired educator who sometimes drives for Uber and Lyft, says that SpaceX employees generally are not the best tippers. He tells me he’s just started his second act, as a real estate agent. Drag queen Kathryn York, who’s performed here and in Vegas and elsewhere for more than 30 years, says it’s a good time for her “gaudy alien costume” that she wears for Dua Lipa’s “Levitating.” Some queens already have silver astronaut looks, she says. “Maybe there’ll be more of that.”
Leo Zuniga, a co-owner of Bar-B who was recently elected to the city’s LGBTQ task force, says a main concern with the arrival of SpaceX is housing. “It’s changed Brownsville in the sense that people who live here are used to a very humble and affordable life,” Zuniga says. “You could buy a house for 60K, but now those houses are 250K, and salaries haven’t changed…. They can’t afford it” because newcomers are buying property “sight unseen.”
SpaceX officially landed in this border town in 2014, soon buying up property 40 minutes east on the Gulf Coast, an enticing location for launching rockets—close to the equator for easy orbit and
