Hillary Clinton's Fight For Equality Will Never Be Sidelined

Hillary Clinton is one of The Advocate's Women of the Year. View the full list from the current issue of the magazine.

When Hillary Clinton became first lady of the United States in 1993, she was unlike any other. She was a staunch advocate for health care, and her strength and passion could not be sidelined. Her strength intimidated the GOP right from the start, and it continued well into her tenures as U.S. senator from New York, U.S. secretary of State under Barack Obama, and as the first female Democratic nominee for president in history in 2016. Time and again, she has demonstrated her commitment to the LGBTQ community -- a stance, as is the case for many politicians, that evolved over time.

In 2016, Clinton became only the second presidential endorsement by The Advocate (the first was for Barack Obama's second term in 2012). During her 2016 campaign, Clinton put herself out there as a loyal ally committed to fighting for full equality. Since then, she's put Donald Trump on full blast, questioning his administration's record on civil rights.

"The attacks on the LGBT community here at home and around the world are striking and scary. I can only imagine what it's like to be in the position that so many people still find themselves in in our country," Clinton said at the national dinner for the Human Rights Campaign in 2017. "I do know what it feels like to be torn down and attacked, and I want you to know that I'm with you."

Though she won the popular vote in the 2016 election, she lost in the Electoral College tally to Trump. Previously unseen footage from the campaign is at the forefront of the new Hulu documentary Hillary, which covers her life from childhood to the 2016 election. Clinton continues to champion women's leadership across all industries -- especially in politics.

Discussing the Hulu documentary, Clinton told ABC News in March, "It's a story not only about me but really women's lives, about politics in our country. You can go back 25 years and see how I tried to get universal health care for everybody and I got burned in effigy because it was so controversial, or what I said in Beijing about women's rights being human rights, and you can tell that not only my life but the lives of many, many millions of other women are reflected in this documentary."

"I was thrust into the role of first lady," she added. "There had never been anybody with an education like mine, with a career like mine, so I was kind of put into a kind of position that nobody had ever been before. There was no guidebook."

Recently, Clinton wrote The Book of Gutsy Women: Favorite Stories of Courage and Resilience with her daughter, Chelsea. The book profiles famous women in history. Clinton's also teamed up with iHeartMedia to produce a (as yet untitled) podcast. Reportedly, it will feature interviews with newsmakers, activists, and shakers.