Gloria Estefan’s Daughter Emily Estefan Said She Was Told That Her Being Gay Would Kill Her Grandmother

Gloria Estefan blazed a path for hardworking Latinas in the music industry over three decades ago. In the time since then, dozens of talented young Latina artists have followed in her footsteps — including her own daughter, Emily.

Emily Estefan is a musician herself

For most of her young life, Emily Estefan remained in the background of her parents’ careers. But in 2014, she made her public singing debut, and the following year, she released her own debut single.

Estefan performed her first major concert on in 2017 at the University of Miami — her mother’s alma mater. She clearly inherited the musical gene from her parents, playing drums, guitar, and keyboard in various music styles. Her album Take Whatever You Want was released that year.

In 2020, Estefan became a co-host of Red Table Talk: The Estefans, a spin-off of the Facebook Watch talk show Red Table Talk. She sits across from her mother Gloria and cousin Lili Estefan, co-host of the popular Spanish-language entertainment news show El Gordo y La Flaca.

Gloria Estefan discouraged Emily from coming out

Emily Estefan has spoken publicly about her sexuality in recent years, and she’s been in a serious relationship with her partner since 2016. But she was never given the opportunity to come out to her parents and family herself; instead, she was outed before she had a chance to tell them herself.

Estefan spoke about how her family handled her sexuality in a 2021 interview on The Real.

“By the time I was ready to say ‘Hey, I’m in love with this girl, this is what happened,’ they were like, ‘Oh, I already knew that.’ And it was painful because you need to get ready for that experience,” she said.

“That was painful and really difficult, and my grandma passed away, and I never got to share it with her because people were afraid,” she continued. “My mom told me, ‘If you tell your grandma and she passes away, that’s going to be your fault.’ And I know that she was just trying to protect me and now we understand it’s just a fierce love and protection for the people that you love, but that in that moment was difficult for me to hear.”

“I never told her and she passed away, and that’s the one thing I regret,” she concluded. “But I know she knew. I know she knew because we had a really incredible relationship. And that’s the one thing I say: you can’t let anybody take you from your path. You gotta be yourself.”

Gloria and Emilio Estefan are LGBTQ advocates today

Both Gloria and Emilio Estefan are proud supporters of their daughter today. In a 2020 interview with Q Salt Lake, Gloria denied that she told her daughter to not come out to her grandmother — and the world — and reiterated her love for her.

“In the show she’s remembering things from her pain and perspective; I did not tell her that. And that was definitely not said,” Estefan said. “I wanted people to listen to her music just as music, because I know how this world works and when I said that to her, what she heard was, ‘Hide, cover up,’ and that’s why I had told her, ‘If you want to get on the [gay Pride] float, I’m there with you.'”

“We know the importance of being supportive. I was incredibly supportive of Emily,” she added. “But it’s a complex thing because our kids are going through so many things, they don’t know sometimes who they are or what they may be feeling.”