Caitlyn Jenner Biography

Caitlyn Jenner is the Olympic gold medalist whose male-to-female transition made her one of the leading American news stories of 2015.

Caitlin Jenner first came to fame as Bruce Jenner, a male athlete who was the gold medalist in the decathlon at the 1976 Summer Games in Montreal. The victory coincided with the American bicentennial celebration, and a healthy blend of good looks and modest demeanor helped make Jenner a Wheaties-box symbol and celebrity. Jenner used that celebrity to carve out a career as a media personality — including a few film appearances and a long-standing gig with NBC as a sports commentator — and to embark on various entrepreneurial projects.

Jenner pulled away from the spotlight during the late 1980s, but resurfaced in the 2000s with a new career on reality television shows, from I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! to Dancing with the Stars.  Jenner gained much more exposure as a regular on the long-running TV series Keeping Up With the Kardashians, which launched in 2007; Jenner’s third wife, Kris Kardashian, is the mother of super-celeb Kim Kardashian and her sisters.

Jenner’s fame took a further twist in 2015, when People.com reported on rumors that at age 65, Jenner was “transitioning into a woman.” She then appeared on the June 2015 cover of Vanity Fair magazine, posing in a one-piece swimsuit with the headline “Call Me Caitlyn.” Speaking of the cover photo shoot by Annie Leibovitz, Jenner told the magazine, “This shoot was about my life and who I am as a person. It’s not about the fanfare, it’s not about people cheering in the stadium, it’s not about going down the street and everybody giving you ‘that a boy, Bruce,’ pat on the back… This is about your life.” The day the photo was released online, Caitlyn Jenner tweeted, “I’m so happy after such a long struggle to be living my true self. Welcome to the world Caitlyn. Can’t wait for you to get to know her/me.”

The E! Online cable network then announced that Caitlyn Jenner would star in a documentary series, I Am Cait, which would “illustrate the star living her life as a transgender woman and telling her intimate story as she seeks out her ‘new normal.'” That show ran for two seasons before being canceled in 2016.

Caitlyn Jenner announced on April 23, 2021 that she would run for governor of California, facing incumbent Gov. Gavin Newsom in a recall election expected for later that year. Jenner, a Republican, said she was running as a “compassionate disrupter.”