As Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Martin O’Malley debated on Saturday in Des Moines, Iowa, one celebrity watched it on TV—after being denied entry to the event.
Caitlyn Jenner—the reality star, former Olympian, and transgender icon—happened to be in Des Moines visiting her alma mater, Drake University, which housed Saturday night’s debate. As Bruce Jenner, she was a Drake track-and-field champion while attending in the 1970s.
Thinking it would be fun to see the event in person, Jenner had her team reach out and request tickets to the event.
She was denied.
Even though her request personally went up to the David Rhodes, the president of debate host CBS News, the Democrats refused to budge.
“Our person told her person that we don’t have any tickets left, which happens to be factual,” Rhodes later explained.
It’s strange that the Democrats, who have bent over backwards in recent years to cast themselves as the party of contemporary civil rights fights, on gay issues and transgender issues, would eject the world’s most famous transgender person from the event—because, theoretically, that’s the kind of “diversity” they should love having in the audience.
However, there’s been chatter since that Jenner being denied entry wasn’t a result of no available tickets, or her celebrity, or even because she’s transgender—rather, it could be a result of her party affiliation.
Despite being transgender, Jenner is actually well-known as a conservative Republican, and reiterated those beliefs in a recent interview earlier this year, even after she had announced her transition to a woman.
Jenner, who apparently stayed in the same Des Moines hotel as the Democratic candidates, instead watched the debate on TV with a group of Drake University students.
When asked by reporters what she thought of the Democratic choices, Jenner replied that she still planned to vote Republican in 2016.
“They didn’t convince me,” she added.
