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When I was a junior in high school, I sat down and wrote a letter to my congressman, Jim Clyburn. He had just become the first Black man elected to Congress from South Carolina [ [link removed] ] in almost 100 years. I didn’t have an “in” or a connection. Being elected President of the National Honor Society was a big deal (at least to me), and I thought who better than my Congressman to swear me in. So I wrote to him. Maybe it was courage. Or maybe I just didn’t know better.
I didn’t know it wasn’t the kind of thing members of Congress usually did. I just knew this was my first step toward service. I wanted a public servant who looked like me, who was walking a path that I wanted to walk, to be standing there with me.
Most members of Congress probably would have ignored the request or sent a congratulatory letter, but Jim Clyburn is different. He came.
That day was the first time I met the man whom I now call my political father or The Boss. It was also the first time I saw what mentorship could look like. He didn’t know me, but he showed up. That simple yes set the course for everything that came after: my years working in his office, my understanding of leadership, and the way I try to show up for others today.
The Boss’s Defining Moment
On our At Our Table [ [link removed] ] episode together, Rep. Clyburn told a story I’d heard before, but this time it hit different. He talked about his senior year of high school in Sumter, South Carolina. A white teacher named Mrs. Lucas asked him to write an essay about his future.
He wrote that he wanted to finish school, go north to New Jersey, and build a career there. Back then, the South wasn’t exactly a place where a young Black man could dream freely.
Mrs. Lucas called him to her office after reading it. She told him she was disturbed by what he’d written—not because she doubted him, but because she believed in him. She said, “Those of us who get an education need to stay in the South. Things will only change if we make them change.”
That conversation changed his life. He stayed.
Listening to him retell that story, I realized something I hadn’t fully understood before: I’d been living out the lesson she gave him, through him.
The Lesson I Lived
I grew up in rural South Carolina, and my first year at Yale felt like I was dropped onto another planet. But I figured out not just how to get by but how to be a success. After graduation, I eventually made my way to Washington, D.C. When I finally got the chance to work for Rep. Clyburn, I was still figuring out what kind of leader I wanted to be. I absorbed everything I could—watching how he spoke to people, how he moved through conflict, how he stayed calm even when the stakes were high. He didn’t talk about leadership as something loud or flashy. He lived it as something steady and deliberate.
When I told him I was thinking about leaving his office, he gave me advice that would change the way I thought about my own path. He said, “My generation of Black politicians didn’t have the choices you do. We went into public service because the doors in the private sector were closed to us. But you—and your generation—have options. Go build some stability. Pay off your loans. Then come back when you’re ready to serve.”
He wanted me to have the freedom that his generation fought for, but didn’t necessarily get to enjoy.
So I took his advice. I left Capitol Hill and went into the private sector. It gave me the grounding and security to eventually return to public life on my own terms.
A few years later, when I made the decision to move back home to South Carolina, I realized I was following the same path his teacher set him on decades earlier. She told him to stay and fight for change in the South. He taught me to build the strength to do the same. That’s how mentorship works: it’s inheritance. The wisdom gets passed down—even if the details of the story change.
Mentorship as Inheritance
Over the years, The Boss and I have gone from mentor and mentee to something more like family. I’ve sought his counsel, and he’s sought mine. That’s the second lesson about mentorship: it’s a two-way street.
On At Our Table, he said something that perfectly captured how he leads: “You lead by precept and example.” In other words, people will listen to what you say, but they’ll follow what you do.
That’s not just a personal philosophy. It’s a model for how communities grow. Every generation needs people willing to teach, and every community needs people humble enough to learn. That exchange is how we keep progress alive.
Mentorship is the way we pass down not just tactics, but values. It’s how we make sure each generation doesn’t have to start from scratch.
Building the Bench Without Burning the House
As we wrestle over defining the brand and message of the Democratic Party, there has been a lot of talk about new leadership. And yes, we need to cultivate a strong bench—fresh energy, new ideas, bold voices. But building the bench doesn’t mean burning the house down.
Rep. Clyburn has said it best when he poses a question that still makes people pause: “Would you rather have an old Thurgood Marshall or a young Clarence Thomas sitting on the Supreme Court?”
Experience isn’t the enemy of progress. Wisdom and energy can and must coexist.
The generation that marched so we could vote has earned the right to still be at the table. The generation that grew up seeing possibility instead of prohibition has the responsibility to bring new tools to the fight. The work isn’t to replace one with the other. It’s to bridge them.
I am proud to say that over the past decade, Rep. Clyburn and I—the mentor and the mentee—have worked together to cultivate the next generation of Democratic leadership in South Carolina.
In 2015, while I was Chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party, we launched the Clyburn Fellowship [ [link removed] ], a program dedicated to training future leaders in campaign strategy, fundraising, and governing. The fellowship equips participants with the skills to become effective elected officials, campaign operatives, and party leaders.
To date, more than 300 Clyburn Fellows, leaders across the state of South Carolina, have completed the program. Many now serve in the state legislature, in county and municipal offices, and as leaders within our state and county parties. Each one serves as a testament to the power of mentorship and investment in the next generation.
Strengthening, Not Replacing
When I think back to that high school letter, I can’t help but see the full circle. I wrote to a man I’d never met, and he showed up. Years later, he told me to build my foundation, and I did. And when the time came, I came home to serve, to teach, and to lift others the way he lifted me.
That’s the power of mentorship. It’s not just about careers. It’s about community. It’s the reason a teacher’s words to a teenage boy in Sumter long before I was born still echo through my life today and will continue to influence generations to come.
We don’t need to replace our current leaders. We need to learn from them, work with them, and prepare the next generation to lead beside them.
Because progress isn’t a relay race. It’s a long walk, side by side. And if we’re lucky, we’ll all have a Boss to remind us to keep going.

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