Jenelle Hutcherson

Who is Jenelle Hutcherson?

Jenelle Hutcherson is an American hair artist, activist, public figure, designer, youth mentor and visionary. She is best known for being the first openly lesbian contestant and the first contestant to wear a tuxedo in the Miss Long Beach 2011 pageant in Long Beach, CA, and the Miss California USA pageant in Palm Desert, CA 2012. Her participation in the pageants shattered stereotypes in many angles; feminist groups, women who have never fit in society’s ideal of what beauty is, butch women embracing themselves, the standard that only feminine women enter pageants, and that women from minority decent don't win pageants.

Hutcherson became a name in the LGBT community, the pageant community, and made headline news in media such as NBC, CBS, KCAL9, Huffington Post, After Ellen, The Advocate, NOH8 Campaign, Courage Campaign, GLAAD, SDGLN, Curve Magazine, GreaterLongBeach.com, Press-Telegram, and Los Angeles Times. The campaign of “Vote for Jenelle” went international after AfterEllen.com published an article about Hutcherson in September 2011.