Community was my bridge out. It’s also America’s path forward.
On Tuesday, September 20, 2011, I stood at the Pentagon press podium before a packed audience of journalists, military officials and my press office staff, to introduce then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen, who would shortly announce the official end to the Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell (DADT) policy that had kept thousands of LGBT troops around the world from serving their country as whole human beings.
My own personal journey to that podium had been a long and unexpected one: from a kid in Tucson, Arizona, who had planned to please his loving parents by becoming a lawyer, getting married and presenting them with grandchildren to ending up as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs: senior Pentagon spokesman, head of the largest communications operation in government, and the first openly-gay individual to be Senate confirmed to a senior Pentagon position. Much of that journey was compartmentalized and confusing. For years, I was two people: one publicly striving to advance in a career in foreign policy and communications; another hidden, struggling to accept my sexual orientation, and wondering whether I would ever find love and acceptance for who I am.
I made my choice in my early ’40s. My bridge out was the Washington, D.C. LGBT masters swimming team — a place where I found out I was not alone, where I met men and women like me whose sexual orientation was part of who they were but did not define or silo them. I won two medals at the 1994 Gay Games in New York and celebrated with teammates from government, business, law, education, health and technology.
I met Pete Buttigieg years later when heading the Arizona team for presidential candidate John Kerry in 2004. I convinced him to join me afterwards in Washington, D.C., to work on a major next-generation international leaders conference under an initiative I spearheaded with former Defense Secretary William Cohen. We became good friends and I applauded his decision to serve in the Naval Reserves and later deploy to Afghanistan. I only learned later that he had been on the same personal journey I had been on years before. He was always a remarkable individual. I beamed and embraced him when I learned he, too, had finally experienced first the relief and then the joy of becoming a complete human being.
The process of DADT repeal, like the journey to individual self-realization and acceptance, was itself long and arduous. But I knew it would be successful when, during the yearlong Pentagon repeal preparation process, I stood facing a tank crew of five young men at Ft. Hood, Texas and asked each what they would do if they found out one of their four colleagues was gay.
“My brother’s gay,” said one.
“My cousin’s gay,” said the second.
“I have lots of gay friends from high school,” said the third and fourth.
Said the fifth: “If this tank is shot and burning, I don’t care if someone is gay or straight, I just care that they’re going to get me out.”
In the back of that packed press room on that Tuesday afternoon eight years ago stood ten men and women in uniform: lesbian and gay troops still hidden, waiting for the official announcement. I’d asked them to be there because I’d been told that, after the press conference, not to “spike the ball.” Instead, after the announcement, I invited the ten into my office — along with dozens of men and women, gay and straight, young and old, civilian and military, to join me in breaking open two cases of Dogfish Head ale I had brought up from my home in Rehoboth, Delaware for the occasion. People heard about it, and started to file in from throughout the building. Crammed into my office, the crowd raised their bottles and toasted to a new era — an era of community, an era of belonging, an era where camaraderie now replaced fear.
Today, I am proud to head a foreign policy and national security team for Pete Buttigieg that includes outstanding men and women from all walks of life, bringing experience and expertise ranging from the National Security Council, the State Department, trade and commerce, the intelligence community and military services to the private sector, NGOs, refugee and hunger relief organizations, health, education and state and local government. That team includes experts heading trade, Latin America, defense, intelligence, international economic, immigration, national security law, research, ambassadorial and state and local government working groups — many of whom are proud to identify as members of the LGBTQ community.
Most of all, we are proud to be working with and for my friend Pete Buttigieg to lay the groundwork for a new era of international engagement for the United States — an era of community, an era of belonging and an era where the real interests of Americans from all parts of the country and all walks of life replace fear, division and personal politics. I’ve got the Dogfish Head ale ready for that.
