Clay Cane
Clay Cane was born in Washington State and later moved to Philadelphia, PA as a teenager with his mother. Not much is said about his family but in an interview with Vibe magazine he did say “ My mother has nothing more than an eighth grade education and she gave me some serious affirmation” in response to a question about how supportive his mother was of him being a young black gay boy. He also said this about his upbringing in the same Vibe magazine interview “ But me as somebody who is black with a white mother, who is from Philly also Washington State, who grew up poor as hell, who also had a crazy religious experience, I have all these identities and intersections.” He attended and graduated from Rutgers University in New Jersey with a BA in English and African-American studies Clay’s commentary is heard on television networks such as MTV, HLN, ABC, MSNBC, FOX and CNN.
He contributes to numerous print and online publications including CNN.com, The Washington Post and Gawker. He has interviewed various celebrities, including Clive Davis, Whoopi Goldberg, Kathy Griffin, Beyoncé Knowles, Denzel Washington, Wes Craven, Hilary Swank, Rihanna, Nicki Minaj, Janet Jackson, Queen Latifah, Jennifer Hudson, Jodie Foster, Jada Pinkett-Smith, Chris Rock, Tyler Perry, Kevin Hart, Diana Ross, Demi Moore, Issa Rae and others. Cane is the co-editor and contributing writer of the 2012 anthology For Colored Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Still Not Enough: Coming of Age, Coming Out, and Coming Home. He also contributed to Where Did Our Love Go: Love and Relationships in the African-American Community. Cane is the author of Live Through This: Surviving the Intersections of Sexuality, God, and Race. The book was published via Cleis Press in 2017. Cane is also a prominent filmmaker.
In 2015, Cane created, directed and produced the BET.com original documentary Holler If You Hear Me: Black and Gay in the Church. This film received a 2016 GLAAD Media Award nomination and was notably featured during a Black History Month event at the Obama White House. That same year, Clay was the recipient of GMAD’s 2016 James Baldwin Revolutionary Award. In 2017, his first book, Live Through This: Surviving the Intersections of Sexuality, God and Race, was released. In November 2017, The Clay Cane Show launched on SiriusXM Urban View channel 126, which discusses politics and culture with civil leaders, politicians, activists and celebrities. His interviews for this show have included: Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Tyler Perry, Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock, Reverend Jesse Jackson, Jenifer Lewis, and more. In 2022, the show was honored with the Best Regularly Scheduled Social Justice Program award from the New York Festivals Radio Awards.
The Grift: The Downward Spiral of Black Republicans from the Party of Lincoln to the Cult of Trump
Part history and part cultural analysis, The Grift chronicles the nuanced history of Black Republicans. Clay Cane lays out how Black Republicanism has been mangled by opportunists who are apologists for racism.
After the Civil War, the pillars of Black Republicanism were a balanced critique of both political parties, civil rights for all Americans, reinventing an economy based on exploitation, and, most importantly, building thriving Black communities. How did Black Republicanism devolve from revolutionaries like Frederick Douglass to the puppets in the Trump era?
Whether it's radical conservatives like South Carolina Senator Tim Scott or Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, they are consistently viral news and continuously upholding egregious laws at the expense of their Black brethren. Black faces in high places providing cover for explicit bigotry is one of the greatest threats to the liberation of Black and brown people. By studying these figures and their tactics, Cane exposes the grift and lays out a plan to emancipate our future.
