American soldier and activist Chelsea Manning was BOTD in 1987. Born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Manning was assigned male at birth, and endured a turbulent childhood, marked by his parents’ alcoholism and neglect. In 2001, Manning and her mother moved to rural Wales, returning to the United States in 2005. While publicly identifying as a gay man, Manning joined the Army in the hope that a hyper-masculine environment would cure her gender dysphoria. After completing basic training in 2008, Manning trained as an intelligence analyst and was posted to an Army unit in Iraq. In 2010, she disclosed nearly 750,000 classified and sensitive military documents to WikiLeaks, including video footage of the 2007 Baghdad airstrike and US diplomatic cables. Arrested later that year, she was held in solitary confinement for three years, attempting suicide several times. In 2013, Manning was convicted by court-martial in 2013 of violating the Espionage Act, and sentenced to 35 years in a maximum security military prison. Hailed as a traitor by conservatives and a hero by the left-wing, her case focused international attention on American involvement in Iraq and sparked debates about data privacy in the Internet age. The day after her sentencing, she announced via her lawyer that she identified as female and was now known as Chelsea. While in prison, she fought a sustained legal battle with the Army for hormone therapy to aid her gender transition, at one point staging a hunger strike in protest at her treatment. In 2016, the Army granted Manning’s request for gender transition surgery, the first for a transgender prisoner, though she failed to receive treatment. In 2017, President Barack Obama commuted Manning’s sentence to seven years, resulting in her release from prison. Manning underwent gender reassignment surgery in 2018. She now makes a living as a public speaker, though has been denied entry to many countries, including Australia and Canada, due to her criminal record. Her memoir README.txt was published in 2022. She lives in Brooklyn, New York City. Her current relationship status is unknown.