Ellen DeGeneres has surprised a newly engaged couple, Kate Austin and Sarah Sulsenti, after Austin took to social media to share that her parents wouldn't be attending their wedding.
"My parents aren’t going to attend my wedding because they don’t like that I’m gay," Austin tweeted alongside a photo of her down on one knee, proposing to Sulsenti in Paris.
"I need someone to walk me down the aisle and someone else for a 'father/daughter' dance," she added, tagging The Ellen Show.
"Plz come, my fiancée and i would cry."
Flying them to Los Angeles from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, DeGeneres invited the loved-up couple on stage.
“If it wasn’t for someone like you, I would’ve never had the courage to just go out there in public and propose to my fiancée,” a clearly emotional Austin told DeGeneres. “So many people don’t accept that, and you paved the way for queer women everywhere.”
“Everybody deserves love,” Ellen responded. “And the fact that your family doesn’t accept it, I am so sorry.”
“My mum was really terrible,” Austin told the studio audience. “I’ve been out for five years now, so she’s said everything you can think of under the sun. But coming out and owning it... taught me courage and owning who I am and it allowed me to be my authentic self.”
While DeGeneres said that she would be unable to attend the actual wedding, she surprised the couple by inviting a group of their friends to join them on stage - where Sulsenti took her turn in getting down on one knee.
DeGeneres then gifted the couple $25,000 - telling them she wanted to see an open bar at their reception.
In a tweet following the segment, Austin wrote: "If i have leaned anything over the last 2 days, it’s that the internet can be SO loving & I’m so grateful we can all connect from so far away from each other!"
She continued: "I hope other lgbtq+ youth out there who fear having unaccepting parents see how kind & loving the rest of the world can be."
You can watch the entire segment below:
