Get it together. Get it together. Get it together.
I never in a million years would have thought strangers telling me to kill myself would have had such a significant impact on my own psyche. I thought I was too old. Too jaded. With so many privileges and such amazing support structures, how could these words on a screen even begin to shake me to my core?
But they did. And they do for so many. Thinking about the constant bombardment of bullying in schools, I wondered, How on earth does anyone survive this?
Across the country, there are young people for whom the glimpse into harassment that I experienced was an everyday reality, both online and in person. And for them it won’t go away in two or three days. They won’t be able to walk out on a stage in a room full of affirming, loving people like I was set to do that night. Hell, they may not even be able to go home to a family who accepts them. Change cannot come fast enough for the students who must build up so much strength and perseverance to merely make it through the school day.
In the days and weeks after the harassment, I worried about my reaction and what it meant for my future in this work and movement. If I couldn’t handle a damn selfie, how could I do more?
The thought plagued my thinking for several weeks. As passionate as I was about the work that I was doing, I wondered whether I was strong enough for it. I worried that I didn’t have the confidence for it. I just wanted to curl up into a ball and give up what little platform I had developed.
The kind of hate I experienced was an occupational hazard. At least for the time being, it was a reality of the world we live in. If I were to continue, I’d have to figure out a way to get past it or be miserable. And then one day, after listening to a story about a reporter who had embraced her weight publicly and faced a serious online backlash because of it, something clicked.
It’s trite to say that many of the biggest bullies are often LGBTQ themselves and in the closet. It may be true in some cases, but it glosses over a more universal truth that underlies the pervasiveness of anti-LGBTQ hate.
Surely, not everyone who bullies is in the closet. But everyone does hold some kind of insecurity. Whether it’s your sexual orientation, your gender identity, how you look, what you sound like, what you do for a living, or any multitude of characteristics, everyone struggles with something that society has told them is wrong. But as LGBTQ people, we have had the courage to embrace something that many think we should be ashamed of; we have stood up and decided to live our truth, not just from a place of authenticity, but so often from a place of pride. We have exercised our own individual agency and power to overcome what was once an insecurity to hold our heads high and proclaim: “This is who I am and there is nothing wrong with me.”
And the bullies see that. They see our power and they are jealous of it. They envy the agency we have been able to exercise and the clear power we hold. So often that is where their hate and vitriol come from.
We are powerful. In Delaware, I had to learn the power of my own voice. Now I needed to understand the power of my own identity—of LGBTQ lives—to move forward. Society can’t make me feel voiceless when I know the power of my own voice. And society can’t make me feel weak when I know that I am powerful just for being.
Suddenly, the comments started to hurt less. I was still cognizant of my safety, but I was no longer bogged down by the insults. I was ready to be at the center of the fight.
After three educational, empowering, and emotional years at CAP, I accepted a job at the Human Rights Campaign as their national press secretary. I had been traveling to and speaking at their events, so it seemed like a natural fit to join the organization in a spokesperson role.
It was hard to leave my job at CAP, since it carried with it so many memories of Andy, but I knew that the day would come sooner or later. And as the nation’s largest LGBTQ equality organization, HRC was at the forefront of the movement that was already transforming America for the better.
So much of the LGBTQ community’s progress was made possible because we had a steadfast defender and supporter in the White House. Barack Obama had done more for LGBTQ rights than all of his predecessors combined. But all of that progress—and the potential for more—was on the line in the 2016 election.
When it came to LGBTQ equality, our country would choose between Hillary Clinton, who, like President Obama, supported and embraced equality, and Donald Trump, who, despite empty claims of being a “friend to the LGBTQ community,” had endorsed nearly every single anti-equality position possible. Throughout the election, Hillary Clinton had run the most trans-inclusive campaign in history. She had endorsed all of the major policy goals of the trans community, lifted up trans people and voices, and consistently included trans people, explicitly, in her vision for a kinder, more welcoming country.
I was passionate about continuing the White House’s support for trans equality and I knew I couldn’t sit on the sidelines. Too much was at stake. Together with two other trans activists, Mara Keisling and Babs Siperstein, as well as an unrivaled ally, Lisa Mottet, we cofounded Trans United for Hillary, a national volunteer effort to mobilize transgender people in support of Hillary Clinton.
In the spring of 2016, Hillary clinched the Democratic nomination and the party began preparing for her formal nomination in Philadelphia that July, a convention that promised to be historic. Trans United for Hillary and the Clinton campaign were intent on making the DNC the most inclusive major party convention ever. We wanted to set a record for the number of openly transgender delegates and even toyed with the idea of a transgender speaker.
Then, just after July 4, I got a call from Roddy Flynn, the executive director of the LGBT Equality Caucus in Congress, a collection of members of the House of Representatives committed to LGBTQ equality and cochaired by the openly LGBTQ representatives. Roddy, an openly gay man, had joined the staff about a year before and had worked tirelessly to expand the caucus’s work on trans issues.
“The caucus cochairs have committed to dedicating half of our six minutes onstage at the Democratic National Convention to having a trans person speak, and they have decided that the caucus will be submitting your name as our speaker.”
Roddy continued: “I wanted to let you know, but I also want to make clear that this is just a request. And it’s still subject to approval from the Clinton campaign and the DNC, so it’s not definite yet.”
My head was spinning just at the possibility. On the one hand, I was scared of the hate that would inevitably come my way on such a major stage. On the other hand, speaking at the Democratic National Convention would be a dream come true.
At thirteen, the same age that I began to get involved in Delaware politics, I was glued to the 2004 Democratic National Convention on C-SPAN. Sitting on the floor of my bedroom, I had been introduced to a little-known Illinois state senator who delivered a barn burner of a keynote address. Barack Obama, I thought then. I hope I can vote for him for president someday.
I was so excited and inspired by the convention proceedings that I built a replica of the convention stage—replete with the Democratic Party donkey flag—in my bedroom, constructed however poorly from plywood and boxes I found in our basement. There I’d deliver my favorite speeches from the week’s proceedings. Throughout that summer, my parents must have heard me recite then–state senator Barack Obama’s keynote ten or twelve times.
In 2012, I was working at my tiny desk in the White House when President Obama accepted renomination for president of the United States. I could never have imagined that just four years later, in 2016, I would stand on that very same stage and address the Democratic convention and the millions of viewers at home.
A few weeks after the initial call with Roddy, on a Sunday afternoon in late July—a week and a day before the convention was scheduled to begin—I finally got the definitive word.
“Give me a call,” Roddy texted me coyly.
&nb
sp; I had been on the edge of my seat for the last three weeks, waiting for any kind of news. My gut is usually right, and I just couldn’t imagine that I would really speak at the convention. Something would get in the way.
“Roddy! What’s up?” I anxiously asked after he picked up the phone.
“I just got word from the campaign. You’ve passed vetting and are confirmed.”
“OH MY GOD! This doesn’t feel real. Are you sure?!”
Almost in disbelief, I called the LGBTQ liaison on the Clinton campaign, who confirmed the news. As the call ended, he closed with a question: “Are you ready to make history?”
“History”? That’s a big word. I knew it would be a “first,” but history didn’t seem to fit. I’m twenty-five, I thought dismissively. I don’t “make history.”
Over the next week, I worked with friends and colleagues to draft my remarks. I had only three minutes, and there was so much to talk about. How would I narrow down everything to 180 seconds?
I knew I wanted to stress two points. The first was that, despite our progress, a lot of work remains in the fight for LGBTQ, and specifically trans, equality. The second point, and, frankly, the main one, was to remind people that behind this national debate on trans rights are real people who love, fear, laugh, cry, hope, and dream just like everyone else. So often we lose sight of the humanity behind these issues. If I was going to be the first, I wanted to use this opportunity to reinforce the almost absurdly simple point that transgender people are, first and foremost, human.
The Democratic National Convention assigned me a volunteer speechwriter. Veteran communications staffers from offices on the Hill typically volunteer their services for the convention. It’s an all-hands-on-deck operation for politicos. I had the option of writing my first draft or talking with the speechwriter on the phone for a bit and allowing her to put something together. Protective of my story and cognizant of the nuances of discussing trans identities, I chose the former.
“Three hundred sixty words, though,” I was instructed. “That’s your limit, and they are strict.”
I wrote out a first draft, utilizing material I had used in the past, and looked at the word count. Six hundred words. Cutting a few words here and there was easy. Trimming more than a third of an already brisk speech was nearly impossible. Sitting at my computer at my desk in the Human Rights Campaign’s Washington headquarters, I thought back to the night in May of 2012, sitting in the AU student newspaper’s office, trying to cut down my coming-out note by more than half.
Given the urgent and numerous challenges facing the community, my 360 words could have easily been filled with a litany of important and necessary policy goals. But as I reworked my speech, a friend reminded me of the Maya Angelou quote that had guided much of my advocacy: “At the end of the day people won’t remember what you said or did, they will remember how you made them feel.”
There were certainly policy goals that I felt a responsibility to include, such as passage of the Equality Act and combating violence against transgender women of color, but I also knew that I needed to be vulnerable and to invite the audience into my own journey, my hopes and my fears, my love and my loss. I needed to heed the lessons I had learned three years earlier while fighting for the Gender Identity Nondiscrimination Act in Delaware: Vulnerability is often the first step on the path toward justice. Vulnerability breeds empathy; empathy fosters support; support leads to action.
I decided that I’d talk about my fear of coming out, my relationship with Andy, and some of the important reforms so needed by the community. And I’d end on an optimistic note: that since coming out as trans, the experiences in my life have demonstrated to me that change is possible.
I submitted my draft to the speechwriter, who made only minor changes before sending it off to the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. A quick approval returned from the decision-makers…along with the news that I would be speaking on Thursday night, the final night of the convention, and just a few hours before Hillary Clinton would take the same stage to become the first woman to officially accept the Democratic nomination for president.
When we found out I was on Thursday’s program, my colleague nonchalantly commented, “How amazing. Hillary Clinton won’t be the only woman making history Thursday night. Sarah will be, too!”
There was that word again. “History.”
On the day before the convention, as I was preparing to head up to Philadelphia with my boss, Jay Brown, my participation in the DNC was announced publicly. As the news broke, driving up with Jay, a transgender man and father of two, we braced for the backlash.
Am I ready for this? Surely this would be the same as the hate from that damn selfie. Only multiplied by ten.
But the negativity was far less than I’d feared. Instead of death threats, my social media filled with messages of support, inspiration, and excitement. I had thought people would be excited for me and for the momentous occasion, but it became obvious quickly that people were also excited for themselves, for the message it sent to trans people across the country.
The next four days were a whirlwind of little sleep, less food, and lots and lots of interviews. ABC News, PBS, Time magazine, the Washington Post, the Huffington Post, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, MTV. In total, I did about forty interviews during the course of the convention.
Really big interviews were done on the private skybox level of the arena. Walking between interviews in different skyboxes, you’d run into senators and governors, celebrities and other speakers clearly as dazed and exhausted as I was. Each skybox was transformed into a small studio, the sound so overwhelming within the arena that the journalists and interviewees were forced to wear massive headsets to hear each other just a foot away.
While I was a little nervous during my first few interviews, the repetition of the same questions and answers soon alleviated my butterflies. Still, each interview was exciting, particularly when I got to sit down with reporters I watched every day.
Growing up, I had watched Katie Couric on Today every morning, but now I was sitting across from her in the Yahoo skybox as she announced in her familiar voice, “On Thursday they’ll be making history again when Sarah McBride speaks.”
It was a lot to take in, but that was probably a good thing. The constant stream of back-to-back interviews kept me distracted and consumed, unable to think about my big, short speech.
Each morning I’d wake up thinking that it had all been a dream, a good dream this time. But then, as I’d look around my hotel room, I’d realize, No, wait, that was all real. I’m speaking at the Democratic National Convention.
Thursday came in a flash, and before I knew it, I was in the car on the way to the Wells Fargo Arena. I rode with Congressman Sean Patrick Maloney, a handsome, openly gay second-term congressman from New York who looks like he came right out of central casting, along with his two beautiful kids and an equally handsome husband. Maloney would be speaking first and then introducing me. As our black SUV weaved through security checkpoint after security checkpoint, Maloney sensed my nervousness and spent the car ride trying to distract me with small talk.
When we arrived, we made our way through a maze of hallways beneath the hustle of the delegates, media, and attendees now arriving for the final and premier night of the convention. For a few hours, we waited in a freezing locker room that had been converted into a waiting room for speakers. The walls were draped with dark blue curtains and the room was filled with IKEA-brand white couches. The only sign that it was a locker room was the big blue carpet with a massive 76ers logo stitched into the middle of it. I anxiously waited, hanging out with the other speakers, including my friend and boss, HRC president Chad Griffin. I reviewed my speech a few times and waited for them to call my name to get ready. I could hear the roar of the arena from backstage, but it still seemed so unreal, as though it were just a TV on full-blast in the room next door
.
As I waited backstage, my parents arrived, along with Sean and Blake. I had managed, in a surprisingly complicated arrangement, to get my parents passes to the final night of the convention. Unfortunately, even for guests of speakers, the tickets weren’t great. My parents found themselves sitting way up in the nosebleed section, just a few rows below the ceiling of the arena.
In a twist of fate, they happened to sit just a few seats behind my old boss at the White House, Gautam Raghavan. “You shouldn’t be up here when Sarah speaks! You should be down on the floor,” he said, referring to the space reserved for delegates. Working his magic, he managed to secure them two passes, and as the convention gaveled in for the final evening, my parents walked out onto the floor of the cavernous arena.
About an hour into the proceedings, a young staffer with a clipboard walked into the green room backstage and called my name. “Sarah McBride, it’s time for you to get ready to go onstage.” And just like that, my nerves shot through the roof. I put on my heels, stopped by for a few touch-ups in the hair-and-makeup room, and then walked down a sterile corridor toward the darkened, cramped area just off the stage.
During the weeks prior to the convention, workers had assembled an impressive stage and display with massive screens. To those in the audience, and to anyone watching on TV, it looked like a permanent feature of the arena. Backstage it looked like a hodgepodge of walls, beams, cords, and screws that I legitimately worried would buckle at any moment. The vibrations from the occasional roar of the crowd and the speakers only enhanced that sensation. My heart felt like it was beating out of my chest as we waited.
In the days leading up to this moment, several people had given me important advice. “You are not speaking to the people in the arena, you are speaking to the camera, the people watching at home, and those who watch a video in the days or years to come,” they told me. “While you speak, particularly since it’s in the first half of the program, people will be milling around and talking. It’s going to feel loud in the arena, and some speakers try to win the crowd over with their charisma and by shouting their speech. Don’t fall into that trip. It will appear terrible to anyone watching on television.”
Tomorrow Will Be Different Page 26