Latest news with #StateofFirsts
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘State of Firsts' Review: Trans Congresswoman Sarah McBride Steps Into the Spotlight for a Doc That's More Than Your Average Political Puff Piece
'Representation' takes two forms in Chase Joynt's new documentary, State of Firsts. The 93-minute film, premiering at Tribeca, follows Sarah McBride's quest to be elected to Congress, representing the state of Delaware; as she's aspiring to be in the House of Representatives, she's also on the verge of making history as the first openly trans member of Congress. McBride is proud of both kinds of representation, but she's pragmatic. More from The Hollywood Reporter 'Andy Kaufman Is Me' Review: Solid but Unrevelatory Doc Uses Puppetry to Tackle the Iconic Comic 'Boy George & Culture Club' Review: An Affectionate Look at the '80s Band and Its Flamboyant Frontman That Entertains but Treads Too Carefully 'Sovereign' Review: Nick Offerman's Fierce Turn as an Anti-Government Extremist Boosts a Timely Drama McBride is a joyful trailblazer and a calculating politician, and Joynt's willingness to feature both sides of her personality is what finally makes State of Firsts more than just a hagiographic puff piece. It would have been easy for Joynt and editor Chris McNabb to trim away the 'politician' side of McBride's personality and let her be the uncomplicated icon that many of her supporters will probably want to see represented — that word again — here. Instead, they show an increasingly public figure at a crossroads for her and for the country, and suggest why McBride may have the mettle to chart a career that embraces her various 'firsts' while positioning herself for substantive further chapters. State of Firsts traces McBride's life from mid-2024 to early 2025, as she goes from an already precedent-shattering tenure as a Delaware state rep to a Congressional candidate — only to become one of the most visible figures of the country when Donald Trump and the Republican Party latch onto virulent transphobia as a wedge issue. Joynt begins the documentary with Delaware's own Joe Biden as president, but he has just completed the disastrous debate that became a catalyst for his exit from the presidential race. We follow McBride as she does the grunt work of retail politics, from knocking on doors to opening campaign offices to a debate that her opponent opts not to attend. She pushes back against intimations that she's running as a trans candidate and not a Delaware candidate, promising that her assortment of pet issues — healthcare, paid family leave, economic insecurity — will be relevant to the state where she was born and raised. Still, she knows that the 'first' guaranteed to come up in interviews isn't related to Delaware's state nickname. I don't know how to precisely describe McBride's attitude toward the inevitable trans-themed questions that she faces in every interview, toward the pressure to address issues of identity even in standard speeches, toward the fact that the 2024 Democratic Convention didn't have a trans speaker on the main stage's lineup. It isn't 'reluctance' and it isn't 'exhaustion.' It isn't 'wariness,' but it may be 'awareness' — awareness that no matter how much she says 'I'm running on behalf of the people of Delaware,' there will always be an AND or BUT that gets brought into the discussion. Circumstances, as casual observers of current events know, get even more heightened. After the election, South Carolina Representative Nancy Mace — who responded to her own experience breaking gender barriers at an entrenched institution (the Citadel) by becoming a cartoonish bully rather than developing an iota of empathy — uses McBride's bathroom use as a way to gain her own share of the spotlight. McBride's responses become a referendum even within her own community. It's an open question as to whether Joynt's very presence is a further source of McBride's self-conscious awareness. Despite McBride repeated emphasis that she's a Delaware candidate and not a trans candidate, the director's interest often seems just as trans-focused as that of the media. A rare exception to that angle comes when a constituent wants to engage McBride on issues related to the Israel/Gaza conflict — and even then, it's obvious that while McBride knows her ideological position, this isn't really the issue she wants to talk about either. Long stretches of the documentary feature McBride, Joynt and usually McBride's perpetually anxious campaign manager driving in cars. In those scenes, McBride's answers to the director's questions are thoughtful, passionate and, if you've seen other interviews with her, delivered with consistent preparedness or prepared consistency. Often State of Firsts is a film about a woman doing interviews while she waits to do more interviews. When McBride isn't answering the director's questions and when Joynt is able to fade into the background, the documentary, which asserts little visual style other than fly-on-the-wall presence, is able to witness moments that showcase the unguarded McBride. Family gatherings and backstage meetings show McBride's vulnerability, dorky sense of humor and general passion for the political process. Much more than when she's making statements or espousing messages, it's these glimpses that allow State of Firsts to pack an emotional punch when she fields a congratulatory call from President Biden, hugs a trans constituent, or briefly takes in the joy that her parents and siblings feel as they walk down the hall on her first day at the Capitol. Whether we're seeing McBride the person or McBride the politician, McBride the Delaware rep or McBride the trans pioneer, State of Firsts portrays a young person realizing she can't avoid being all of these things at once — and facing, perhaps for the first time, the idea that she can't be a perfect representative of everything at all times. That's more interesting than if State of Firsts were just a love letter. 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Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Rep. Sarah McBride Says Attacks on Her Gender Identity Show Jealousy of 'Bullies': 'Hurt People Hurt People' (Exclusive)
Sarah McBride made history by becoming the first openly transgender member of the House of Representatives Her congressional campaign is the subject of the new documentary State of Firsts The film premiered June 7 at the Tribeca FestivalRep. Sarah McBride refuses to let criticism bog her down. The Delaware congresswoman made history in November 2024 when she became the first openly transgender person elected to the House of Representatives. However, her boundary-breaking win also came with hate, discrimination and deliberate misgendering by critics and colleagues. McBride, whose trailblazing campaign is the subject of the new documentary State of Firsts, which premiered June 7 at the Tribeca Festival and will screen through June 11, tells PEOPLE that "it's not always easy" to face the critics. "It is hard and it gets to me," she says, adding, "I'm not new to hate." "Every job I've ever had, I've had death threats," says McBride, who was a state senator and political advocate prior to joining Congress. "I'm not new to feeling out there and vulnerable." The way McBride sees it, attacks on her gender identity aren't really about her. "When people try to diminish me or impugn my dignity, it says a lot more about them than it does me," she says. "I truly believe that hurt people hurt people." Since her first term in Congress began in January, McBride has been targeted by a bathroom bill from Rep. Nancy Mace or South Carolina — which bans transgender people from using restrooms that don't correspond with their sex at birth — and was intentionally and repeatedly misgendered by Texas Rep. Keith Self during a hearing. Both moments are included in State of Firsts, which features a clip of Mace responding to a reporter who asks if her bathroom resolution is linked to McBride's arrival in Congress. "Yes, and absolutely and then some," Mace replies. McBride says in the documentary that she didn't realize the bathroom issue would blow up, but soon realized, "There will be members who will confront me in the women's restroom to have a viral moment." She adds that she knew she would be targeted more as her campaign progressed, and once Republicans maintained control of the House after the 2024 election, she started to think, "They're going to try to ban me from the restroom." While speaking with PEOPLE, McBride says she's undeterred by such attacks. "Everyone deals with something about themselves that society tells them they should be ashamed of or that they should hide," she says. "The thing about so many of us who live openly and authentically is we have taken that thing that society has told us we should hide, and we've not only accepted it, but in many cases we are walking forward from a place of pride in it." That confidence, McBride says, is something her critics want for themselves. "The bullies see that power, they see that individual agency in conquering our own fears and our own insecurities, and they're jealous of it," McBride tells PEOPLE. "I am reminded in those moments that I am powerful just by being." Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. The congresswoman even has kind words for her detractors, sharing a hopeful message for the people who've come after her. "I hope that those who are not summoning the best versions of themselves, that they find healing, that they find courage, that they find love, and that they find a home within themselves and in this world that they so clearly yearn for," she says. State of Firsts director Chase Joynt filmed McBride in the days before, during and after her historic campaign, capturing highs like the night she won her election, but also difficult moments like blatant disrespect from her colleagues in Washington and backlash from the trans community when she agreed to follow the Capitol's bathroom policy. In a statement included in the State of Firsts' press notes, Joynt said, "We could not have anticipated the force with which Sarah herself would become the central target of transphobic assaults in the rise of Trump's second presidency." McBride, who recently marked 100 days in office, tells PEOPLE that despite the hurdles she faced in the first few weeks and months as a Congresswoman, she's "confident" and "determined" — and her bullies have "moved on." "They realized that I'm not gonna play their game," she says. Read the original article on People
Yahoo
07-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Rep. Sarah McBride Details Unique Bond with AOC Over the ‘Spotlight' They've Both Faced in Congress (Exclusive)
Rep. Sarah McBride tells PEOPLE that AOC is "a friend and someone who I have turned to for advice" during her first term in the House In a powerful conversation with AOC featured in the State of Firsts documentary about her run for Congress, McBride discusses the pressures she faces as the first openly trans congresswoman State of Firsts premieres June 7 at the Tribeca Festival and screens through June11Rep. Sarah McBride has a strong ally in Congress in one of the House's most visible figures: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. McBride, 34, tells PEOPLE that AOC, 35, has been a source of support since she began her first term in Congress in January. McBride, who made history when she became the first openly transgender person to be elected to the House in November 2024, is the subject of the new State of Firsts documentary from director Chase Joynt, which follows her campaign for Congress. In one scene from the documentary filmed after she won her seat as a U.S. representative from Delaware, McBride and AOC sit down in her office for a chat about "firsts." While speaking to PEOPLE ahead of State of First's Saturday June 7 premiere at the Tribeca Festival, McBride detailed her important bond with the lawmaker. "She's definitely become a friend and someone who I have turned to for advice. She entered Congress with a profile that exceeds mine with a lot of attention," McBride says. "And you know, it wasn't always easy for her." AOC made history in 2018 as the youngest women ever elected to Congress and currently represents New York's 14th congressional district. But in her first term, she said she faced backlash for her outfits and was treated like an intern. McBride says AOC's struggles in her first term have strengthened their connection. "I have often gone to her as one of the few people who knows what it's like coming in as a new member, as a freshman and having a spotlight on you that exceeds what most freshmen have," McBride says, noting, "The challenge of navigating a new place, a new workplace with that spotlight, with those attacks, there are very few people who have that experience." During the meeting between the two congresswomen featured in State of Firsts, the Delaware lawmaker tells AOC she's "struggling with protecting my voice and my ability to be seen and heard authentically for who I am and what I am here to focus on, and the inevitable pool that others are trying to pull me in." Ocasio-Cortez nods as she replies, "What people don't see and what they don't really experience is that being the first means being the only." She continues, "The immense amount of expectation placed on anyone who's a first, in my experience, that is not something that goes away." She then becomes heated over critics who have attacked McBride for her gender identity, telling her, "What they go after is your essential dignity as a human being. And, to be frank, that's what really pisses me off about this." "I want to respect your autonomy and I want to respect your story and how you want to handle this for yourself, but I also want to clock these motherf------," she exclaims. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. In a moment also included in State of Firsts, AOC hits back after the House bans trans people from using the Capitol's single-sex bathrooms that match their gender identity, calling the proposal "disgusting" in an interview that first aired on Spectrum News. "All it does is allow these Republicans to go around and bully any woman who isn't wearing a skirt because they think she might not look woman enough,' she says in the interview. While speaking with PEOPLE, McBride says AOC is someone she has "come to rely on for advice," adding, "She certainly has become a friend and I really deeply respect her." State of Firsts premieres at Tribeca Festival on June 7. Read the original article on People
Yahoo
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
‘I'm More Confident Now': Sarah McBride Reflects on Trans Attacks in Congress
On election night, as she endured the grueling hours between polling place closures and the first waves of results, Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.) declared that she was going to throw up. 'It's weird to know that you're in a fork in your life as it's actually happening,' McBride said, shortly before giddily announcing to her campaign staff that early results showed her overperforming former vice president and 2024 Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. The unguarded moment will be revealed for the first time on Saturday, when State of Firsts — a new documentary from director Chase Joynt and producers Jenna Kelly and Justin Lacob — premieres at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City. The documentary follows McBride over the course of her successful campaign to become the first openly transgender person ever elected to Congress, and the onslaught of Republican attacks against her after she won. 'One of the things that wasn't captured is that I was worried that I was going to underperform because I was trans,' McBride tells Rolling Stone ahead of the film's debut. 'Right before the polls closed, I said, OK, I think I underperformed by two points,' and I would have been happy just to perform on par with other Democrats. For that not to have been the case was meaningful to me, given my expectations.' When the votes were fully tallied, McBride won the election handily despite targeted attacks against her identity as a transgender woman from her local opponents, and a national campaign vilifying transgender Americans by Donald Trump and the Republican Party. McBride's historic victory in Delaware was one of the few highlights for Democrats on Election Night, as by the following morning Trump had soundly defeated Harris, and by the end of the week Republicans had seized control of both chambers of Congress. State of Firsts paints a picture of a woman caught in a tug of war between the laurels of historic achievement, the expectations of both her constituents in Delaware as well as the trans community, and the emotional terror of being a target of the GOP's anti-trans vitriol. The documentary goes behind the scenes of McBride's response to Republican efforts to ban her from using women's bathrooms in the Capitol following her election. Before McBride even took her oath of office, Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) — who in 2023 called herself 'pro-transgender rights' — and Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) launched a public effort to have their newly elected colleague banned from using the women's restroom and other sex-segregated spaces for women in the Capitol. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) would ultimately enforce such a rule. 'If you would have asked me three months ago what bathroom I would use in the Capitol, I would have said, 'Oh I'll just use the women's restroom,' or [that I would] 'just go to the private bathrooms,' McBride recalls in the film during a venting session in her car. 'And then the election happened, and Republicans maintained control of the House, and I started to think 'they're going to try to ban me from the restrooms.'' McBride emphasizes throughout the documentary that at different points in her life she has oscillated between the roles of advocate and activist — and considers them to be distinct. As a lawmaker, the congresswoman maintains that her role is not to become embroiled in public spats with Republicans hellbent on making an example of her, but to be the most effective member of Congress she can be. 'A win for them is not me not using the restroom. A win for them is me fighting back and them turning me into a caricature. A win for them is undermining my effectiveness as a member of Congress,' she says to the camera in State of Firsts. McBride's decision to abide by Johnson's bathroom decree was not without controversy within the trans and LGBTQ+ community, but she stands by it. 'I think there is actually something so powerful about seeing someone with dignity and calmness navigate a firestorm — because then it creates a really clear contrast between you and those who are coming after you,' McBride tells Rolling Stone. 'I am more confident now than I was even then about my approach, about the rightness of my approach. I'm more confident now because I've seen the behavior dissipate and diminish. I'm more confident now because I've seen that my effectiveness has actually been enhanced by the way that I navigated this.' 'I appreciate that when you are a 'first,' people viscerally feel your highs, and they viscerally feel your lows,' she adds about the public reaction to her colleagues' attacks against her. 'But I am confident that for both myself, my constituents, and all of the various communities I'm a part of that the approach that I have taken has maximized the positives for the long term, maintained my effectiveness, and enhanced my effectiveness.' The film is premiering during the first week of June's Pride Month celebrations, which are taking place amid a palpable climate of anxiety as the Trump administration continues to attack the LGBTQ+ community. Earlier this week, reports emerged that the Pentagon had chosen to time the announcement of their decision to strip the USNS Harvey Milk of its name to coincide with Pride Month. State of Firsts director Chase Joynt, who is also trans, tells Rolling Stone that in his view 'there's never been a more important time to be telling trans stories and to be getting as close to issues, people, and politics as possible. I think that it has never felt more urgent to be creating work [and] creating media that can be considered as counter to the onslaught of misinformation and anti-trans legislation.' 'My sincere hope is that through this portal, through this access, audiences emerge with greater understanding of not only trans rights and the specifics of what's happening to trans people, but also the fact that we are dealing with issues that are so much more in excess of one community, one person, one moment or one time,' he adds. Joynt explains that he wanted to explore the complexities of being a 'first' through the lens of McBride's election. 'The history of trans representation is a history that positions one person as exceptional and away from that pack. There's always that icon, that person to whom we're looking, and it's a fantasy,' he says, adding that the documentary would ideally allow viewers to grapple with the weight and expectations of being in such a position through the perspective of an aspiring candidate. McBride's aspirations are a central theme of her story. Early in the film, her father recounts how as a child McBride was obsessed with the podium he used to teach classes at their church. When her parents got her a podium of her own, a young McBride would practice reciting famous American political speeches. 'I just thought to myself, 'Ooh, we're in deep trouble here,'' her father tells the filmmakers, with her mother adding that while she was confident her daughter would win her election, the thought of her stepping onto the national stage under a Trump presidency 'scares' her. McBride tells Rolling Stone that she would reassure that child — full of ambition, a fixation on Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1932 inaugural address, and a blissful ignorance of the many trials to come — that everything would work out. 'It's not always easy. It's often two steps forward, one step back. It's going to be painful. They're going to be moments where you just want to disappear, that you want to go into hiding, that you wonder whether everything will work out,' she says. 'But I wish I had known then — and there are times where I still have to summon this —that it was going to be OK.' 'There are so many reasons for us to have hope from the historic progress that we are the beneficiaries of right now, the fact that we are all in so many ways, living in possibility,' McBride says. 'What we celebrate this Pride Month is that for our community, we have a superpower — and the superpower is the power of our proximity. When we are proximate, when we are present, when we show up as the best versions of ourselves and the most authentic versions of ourselves, we have the capacity to open hearts, change minds and transform that which once seemed so impossible that it was almost incomprehensible.' More from Rolling Stone Fletcher Talks About Her Radically Honest New Album and the 'Magical Feeling' of New Love Pentagon Will Celebrate Pride Month by Renaming Ship Honoring Gay Rights Icon 'Transphobia Is Not Victimless': Online Queer Communities Remember Charlotte Fosgate Best of Rolling Stone The Useful Idiots New Guide to the Most Stoned Moments of the 2020 Presidential Campaign Anatomy of a Fake News Scandal The Radical Crusade of Mike Pence
Yahoo
04-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'State of Firsts' documentary explores Sarah McBride's historic first months in Congress
When Rep. Sarah McBride, the nation's first openly transgender member of Congress, said in November that she would comply with a policy from House Republicans that banned her from using public women's restrooms in the House, many in the transgender community were disappointed — and some even furious. Some people expected McBride, as the only trans member of Congress, to fight more, especially given efforts by state Republicans and the Trump administration to roll back trans rights. In 'State of Firsts,' a documentary about McBride's election that will premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City on Saturday, McBride says the criticism from some in her own community hurt but that she felt she would be giving in to Republicans by responding in a way that made her less effective at her job. 'I also think people misunderstand the difference between activists and elected officials and the roles that those respective jobs play in social change and social movement,' she says. 'Even if you disagree with that, there would be a bounty on my head if I said that I would not comply.' The documentary explores the unique pressures McBride faced entering Congress. It provides some of the first glimpses at how the bathroom resolution and the criticism from her own community has affected her, and it addresses questions about the limits and challenges of representation and of being a historic 'first' in federal office. 'It's easy to tell a simple story about a first or about a person's experience, but you don't get many lessons learned from simple stories,' McBride told NBC News ahead of the documentary's premiere. 'My motivation in agreeing to this was to hopefully help chronicle what it was truly like … so that others who come after me can maybe pull from some of the lessons and some of the experiences, so that their experience is maybe a little bit easier or they can do it a little bit better.' Being first isn't necessarily new for McBride. She became the first out trans woman to work in the White House when she interned with the Obama administration, according to her 2018 memoir, 'Tomorrow Will Be Different: Love, Loss, and the Fight for Trans Equality.' Then, in 2016, she became the first trans person to speak at a major political convention when she gave a speech at the Democratic National Convention. In 2020, she became the country's first openly trans state senator. Though McBride had an idea of what it was like to be a 'first,' she entered Congress at an unprecedented time for trans people, as dozens of states have enacted restrictions on the bathrooms trans people can use in schools and government buildings and their access to transition-related care and school sports. The documentary also shows how the Democratic Party has been fractured both by the conservative campaign to restrict trans rights and the ongoing war in Gaza. The documentary shows McBride knocking on constituents' doors before the Democratic primary election in Delaware in September. McBride asks a constituent whether she can count on their support, and the constituent says, 'The only thing that would dissuade us from voting for you is can we count on you to call for a ceasefire?' McBride responds that she has called for a ceasefire, and the constituent asks, 'How much can we count on you to be vocal about it?' before becoming emotional and saying it's hard to see images of kids who 'look like our kid.' (The film also shows the reporter of this article asking McBride about the interaction in an interview.) Chase Joynt, the documentary's director, said it was important for him to show that moment not only because it revealed an important issue for one of McBride's constituents, but also because it spoke to a larger theme of the film: that much of the public expected McBride to be an activist, even though that isn't who she has been for most of her political career as a progressive Democrat largely in line with the party's platform. 'One of the central tensions in the film and of this political moment are the frictions between activist and electoral strategies of social change and the pressures put on politicians, in particular, to make statements and make claims and to be constantly negotiating what's at stake in all of those moves,' Joynt said. The documentary delves into the LGBTQ community's complex response to McBride's becoming a 'first.' It includes audio from Slate's 'Outward' podcast, in which writer Jules Gill-Peterson says, 'This first elected representative is really not one that it seems like many trans people are going to get excited about, given some of her policy positions and the way that she's sort of aligned with the party establishment.' Co-host Christina Cauterucci, a Slate editor, responds: 'I think she's had to be like that. I think a trans person who was more radical in any sense just simply would not have achieved what she's achieved.' Joynt said he hopes the documentary encourages people to think about the potentials and limitations of representation in political office. 'We can expand that conversation to think about a politics of representation that requires trans people to be good, that requires trans people to be palatable, to be on the right side, whatever that might mean, of certain issues,' Joynt said. Joynt said one of the 'perils' of coverage of political figures, particularly those who are 'firsts,' is that 'we put a lot of pressure on individual people to represent all of the various issues and needs,' when, in reality, no one person of any identity can represent all relevant views. McBride said that with this film, she wants people to see more than just headlines and short video clips. She wants them to get a glimpse of the tradeoffs and challenges — as well as the joy and humor — that come with being a first in Congress. 'It's so easy to forget the fullness of who people are and the complexities that every single person is navigating and often the impossible choices that people have to make,' she said. She added that, since the bathroom resolution, she has become 'more confident now than I have ever been that the approach that I am taking since getting to Congress is working.' 'Some of my colleagues realized that I'm just not fun,' she said, laughing. 'I'm not going to give them the response that they want, because I always knew that this was not about their actual, genuine distaste for trans people, it's because they wanted attention, and because I refuse to let them use me as a pawn, the reality show has moved on to other free gimmicks.' This article was originally published on
