The Untold Truth Of Chelsea Clinton
Chelsea Clinton may not be a part of a royal family, but she is a part of the closest thing to it in the United States: a political dynasty. The Clintons are helmed by Chelsea's parents, former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Now the face of the Clinton family, Chelsea has finally stepped into her own spotlight after years of being contextualized in relation to the people around her.
In addition to being accustomed to the constant scrutiny that comes with being a member of a first family, Chelsea is also extremely well-educated. She received her doctorate from Oxford University, focusing on international relations, on top of a bachelor's degree and two master's degrees, according to the Clinton Foundation. She's also a wife and mother of three children, on top of being the vice chair of the Clinton Foundation — clearly Chelsea is one busy woman!
But what else is there to know about this Clinton? Does she have any secrets, despite the fact that she's never not been in the public eye? Read on to discover her untold truth.
Chelsea Clinton started reading newspapers when she was four years old
When Chelsea Clinton was a young girl in elementary school in Arkansas, one of her teachers described her as precocious. It was a fitting adjective for her at the time, as she started reading newspapers when she was four years old and having informed discussions with her mom and dad.
"My parents expected me to have an opinion about what I thought the most important stories were, and then to be able to muster an argument in support of what I thought was right or wrong," she recalled in an interview with The Guardian. "They taught me early on the difference between opinion and fact."
That's a habit Clinton has carried into adulthood, as she still prioritizes being informed. "My husband, Marc, and I still subscribe to old-fashioned newspapers," she revealed to Variety. "We get The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and the FT [Financial Times]." She also reads online news and listen to the BBC World Service on the radio in the morning.
This is how Chelsea Clinton deals with all of her stress
Most people have something that they do to cope with or burn off their stress, such as relaxing with a cocktail or practicing meditation. For Chelsea Clinton, she turned to physical activity in order to decompress and re-center. "I think I have run on every street in Manhattan," she shared in an interview with Vogue. "Running is my prophylactic stress relief for the day. Or the segue so that I can go home and be with my husband in a kind of clearheaded way." That's certainly a super healthy way to cope, especially given how insanely busy Clinton is.
When Clinton goes for a jog, it's usually early in the morning or at night, and she always goes it alone. "Running is the one part of my life in which I fundamentally feel like the observer instead of the observed," she added. Considering the amount of scrutiny she's always under, that has to be a welcome relief.
Chelsea Clinton loves nachos and dines like a "real person"
Believe it or not, Clinton is a real person with real, down-to-earth habits, despite the fact that she's heir to the Clinton dynasty. According to an interview with The Cut, she loves nachos, which brought her to a Baja Fresh for lunch one day — much to the delight of an admirer who couldn't believe her eyes. "Oh my gosh," she gushed. "Chelsea Clinton. I can't believe you're here. What are you doing here? You're such a real person, sitting here in Baja Fresh." Hey, when you want nachos, you want nachos!
In addition to being normal about her dining habits, Clinton is also normal regarding her movie preferences. "I love action movies," she told Variety. "Of course I'm going to see Furious 8. I've already seen Logan." She added that she's super pleased that Logan's predecessor in Wolverine 3 will be a little girl, which frankly we're happy about as well.
This is what Chelsea Clinton was doing the night her mother lost the election
When Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 presidential election to Donald Trump, it was devastating for the entire Clinton family. But Chelsea Clinton didn't have time to really let loose and take it all in, as she was busy with parenting duties that night. "I was still breastfeeding," she recalled in an interview with The Cut. "Aidan was not even five months old. We went and we voted, and then I spent time with our kids and spent a lot of time breastfeeding and pumping, because that's what women do when we're committed to having that relationship with our babies." Once again, Clinton shows just how relatable she can be in unexpected moments.
Despite the pain of seeing her mother lose such a high-stakes election, Chelsea soldiered on and focused on her family for the duration of the evening. "We were with my mom, and I pumped a lot on and off for the rest of the night," she continued.
Chelsea Clinton can't remember when she wasn't criticized by the public
One very unfortunate aspect of Chelsea Clinton's life has been the cruelty that's come with being under constant scrutiny. When she was younger, she was berated for her appearance, even though she was only a teenager. And as she's gotten older, she's been bullied online, and approached by strangers who've said terrible things to her in the street.
But, rather than take any of it to heart or stoop to the level of others, Clinton chooses to rise above it all. "For me, maybe because I've had so much vitriol flung at me for as long as I can literally remember, people saying awful things to me even as a child, I've never found it productive, personally, to engage in that way," she explained in an interview with The Guardian. "To retaliate with crass language or insult someone personally — I just don't think I'm built that way."
This is what a night at grandma's looked like when Chelsea Clinton was a kid
Chelsea Clinton may be a super cosmopolitan New Yorker now, but she's still a southern girl at heart. Growing up, Clinton often spent her weekends with her grandmother in her home in Arkansas, where she kept a cardboard cutout of Elvis Presley. "Every Saturday, she would have a Scotch-and-soda, only one, at five o'clock," Clinton recalled in an interview with The Cut. And then she would make dinner and we always had homemade macaroni and cheese, stewed tomatoes, and either chicken or fish."
In addition to dinner, Clinton and her grandmother had other super southern traditions. "On special occasions she would bake a chocolate cake, and then we would watch —truly, every Saturday night that I stayed with her — a different Elvis movie," she continued. "And there are 50 of them. That's just what we diiid." She added that they would also attend church the next morning.
Chelsea Clinton used to be friends with Ivanka Trump
Long before the candidates for the 2016 presidential election, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump were selected by their parties to run, Chelsea Clinton was chummy with Ivanka Trump. In fact, Clinton had kind words about the first daughter back in 2015. "She's always aware of everyone around her and ensuring that everyone is enjoying the moment," she told Vogue (via The Guardian). "It's an awareness that in some ways reminds me of my dad, and his ability to increase the joy of the room. There's nothing skin-deep about Ivanka."
Although both presidential children grew up to be gorgeous, from the looks of it, their friendship didn't survive beyond the election. Clinton has also been a vocal opponent of the Trump administration, of which Ivanka is a part. "I do not believe that many of the people that he has hired have been qualified to do the jobs," she told The Guardian. "Not only do I want an administration that isn't venal, corrupt and focused on making life harder for millions of Americans, I also want a competent administration."
Where does Chelsea Clinton find her power?
If you had to think of one adjective to describe Chelsea Clinton, certainly the word "busy" would be near the top of the list. Between working for the Clinton Foundation, being a wife and mother of three, writing books, supporting her parents, and attending speaking engagements, Clinton is practically scheduled down to the minute, according to The Cut. That's the only way she can get everything done without overextending herself!
So what does Clinton draw upon to get her through those hectic days? "At the moment, I find empowerment, inspiration, and, in the best sense, obligation from my children," she mused in an interview with Variety. "I didn't know I could care any more intensely about all the things I already cared about until I became a mom and found out that I could." She also cites the example her mother set for her as an inspiration, as it helps her to stay balanced in her career.
Becoming a mother changed how Chelsea Clinton sees her parents
Becoming a mother gave Chelsea Clinton an outlook of her parents that she never had before. "I didn't know what a gift my children would give me in seeing my parents as grandparents," she confessed in a chat with Stylist. That's not altogether surprising, as becoming a parent yourself can show you just how much work it is, which might make you appreciate your own parents more.
But there's more to it than that, as Clinton was especially touched by her mother's actions in particular. "Seeing my mom with her not only immediate love, but her immediate caring for our children, from the second they were born, and how involved she is in both the glamorous parts of being a grandparent — like getting to spoil them despite my best efforts to the contrary — but also being so willing to help clean up after them or change a diaper. It's a gift," she added.
Chelsea Clinton had to teach her parents how to use their smartphones
When one of your parents was the president of the United States, and the other very nearly was as well, you can imagine that you'd feel like you have some pretty big shoes to fill. But that doesn't mean that Chelsea Clinton was simply a sponge that soaked up her parents knowledge. No, she has schooled both of them on a thing or two as well.
"I mean, I definitely taught my parents how to text and how to charge their phones, which was I remember a very mysterious thing for them at the beginning...," she confessed at a panel at SXSW. "I'm sure that that's not uncommon for many of us in this room, having taught our parents." It's definitely a rite of passage for millennials!
Clinton was also there to see another member of her family adapt to new technologies, something she truly admired. "My grandmother, before she passed away, was an avid user of her iPad, which I always thought was pretty amazing," she continued. "At 90 she learned to use an iPad, which she used every day until she died when she was 92."
Losing her grandmother was one of the hardest things Chelsea Clinton endured
Chelsea Clinton has been through a lot in her lifetime, from dealing with public criticism to absorbing inhumane insults to watching her mother lose the 2016 election. But as her best friend Nicole Fox told Vogue, losing her grandmother was the most difficult thing Clinton has ever gone through. That's why she abruptly changed her summer plans when she knew the end was coming. "My grandmother and I spent a lot of time in Washington together, and then she was diagnosed with colon cancer four days after I graduated from Stanford," she recalled in an interview with Vogue. "Although I clearly wish she hadn't had to go through that, that was the first time where we really talked about everything."
Now that her grandmother has passed on, Clinton does something special to remember her. "I try to wear something of my grandmother's every day," she revealed. "Because I miss her every day. Every single day."
Chelsea Clinton just couldn't enjoy working in finance
Once Chelsea Clinton had finished her first master's degree at Oxford, she immediately moved to New York City — and hasn't looked back. As of this writing, Clinton still resides in a gorgeous home in the city she loves.
For six years, though, she worked in finance — first at McKinsey & Company and then at a Wall Street hedge fund — in order to fulfill an acquired ambition. "I really wanted to work in the private sector," she explained to Vogue. "I felt as if I had no inherited understanding of that from my parents."
But working in finance just wasn't cutting it for Clinton, as she felt it just wasn't the right fit for her. "I didn't fundamentally care about denominating success through money," she continued. "And I think it's important to be in professions in which you care about the metric of success." That's when Clinton decided to return to school, first to Columbia for a master's in public health, then again to Oxford for a doctorate. Still, Clinton still went on to make a lot of money.
This is how Chelsea Clinton met her husband
On July 31, 2010, Chelsea Clinton tied the knot with her longtime boyfriend Marc Mezvinsky in a private ceremony in Rhinebeck, New York, according to ABC News. As it turns out, the pair had known each other since they were teenagers, though they didn't start dating until Clinton was going through a painful breakup much later, according to Bari Lurie, Clinton's chief of staff. "Chelsea really used Marc as a shoulder to lean on, and it just kind of happened," she revealed to Vogue. "She always says that it's like one of those bad after-school specials."
By all accounts, the marriage between Clinton and Mezvinsky continues to be a happy and supportive one, and Clinton's friends adore her husband. Additionally, Mezvinsky is super appreciative of his wife, who he says compliments him in just the right ways. "She's very much the yin to my yang," he gushed. "I don't want to say I'm aloof, but I definitely can exist in a cloud. I walk into parking meters. She's the antithesis of that. She's like: This is where the parking meters go!" Aww!
Will Chelsea Clinton ever run for office?
It makes sense that being informed about the world is important to Chelsea Clinton, who also believes in being active in governmental affairs. "I believe that engaging in the political process is part of being a good person," she proclaimed in an interview with Vogue. "And I certainly believe that part of helping to build a better world is ensuring that we have political leaders who are committed to that premise."
So, when pressed by Vogue in a 2012 interview as to whether or not she'll run for office, Clinton had a decidedly thought-out response. "If there were to be a point where it was something I felt called to do and I didn't think there was someone who was sufficiently committed to building a healthier, more just, more equitable, more productive world? Then that would be a question I'd have to ask and answer," she explained.
But if you were hoping to see Clinton on the ballot anytime soon, she quashed that idea in a 2019 interview. "I am not running for public office," she shared with Variety. But who knows what the future will bring?