Katie Miller

Special Assistant

Expertise: LGBT military issues, women in the military, relationship recognition and marriage equality, LGBT policy and politics

Katie Miller spent the first half of her undergraduate education at the U.S. Military Academy, where she was ranked eighth in her class of more than 1,000 cadets. An aspiring Army officer, Miller could not reconcile her pride in her position with the daily half-truths required from her under “don’t ask, don’t tell.”  In 2010, she made national headlines by announcing her resignation from West Point on live television and revealing her sexuality to the American public.

Miller immediately joined the founding board of OutServe— a then underground network of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) service members — and traveled the media circuit to advocate the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” She has appeared on MSNBC, CNN, and ESPN; been featured by the New York Times, Glamour, and the Associated Press; and spoken at college campuses across the country. She also escorted Lady Gaga to the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards in a public demonstration for the discriminatory law’s repeal.

A Truman scholar and Point Foundation scholar, Miller graduated in 2012 from Yale University with a bachelor’s degree in political science. She continues to advocate for LGBT service members as chair of a policy committee for the newly merged OutServe-Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, making her the youngest board member of a major LGBT organization. Miller is also a regular contributor to OutServe magazine, where she has published significant pieces on military policy for HIV-positive members and the issue of transgender military service.

Miller joined the LGBT Research and Communications Project at the Center for American Progress last fall.