Sarah Kate Ellis

Sarah Kate Ellis was named CEO & President of GLAAD in January 2014 after a successful career as an award-winning media executive and communications strategist. Ellis has refocused GLAAD’s crucial advocacy to accelerate acceptance of the LGBT community through a variety of compelling and effective initiatives, campaigns, and programs.

A powerful communicator, Ellis has used GLAAD’s position as the world’s leading media advocacy organization to demand fair and accurate coverage of the LGBTQ community. Ellis also commissioned GLAAD's annual Accelerating Acceptance report, providing a window into national sentiment towards the LGBTQ community. In 2018, Ellis launched the GLAAD Media Institute (GMI), which focuses on research into LGBTQ representation and acceptance, consulting on LGBTQ storylines in media and Hollywood, and training activists on LGBTQ media advocacy and storytelling that creates change. Ellis is also the Executive Producer of the GLAAD Media Awards, which recognize and honor media for their fair, accurate, and inclusive representations of the LGBTQ community.

Under her leadership, Ellis has evolved GLAAD from a media watchdog organization to one of the most powerful cultural change agents across industries. In response to the unique and disproportionate challenges facing LGBTQ people during the pandemic, Ellis executive produced “Together in Pride: You are Not Alone,” a digital event that highlighted the LGBTQ response to COVID-19 and raised critical funds for local LGBTQ centers providing life-saving services. Ellis has also taken her mission of LGBTQ acceptance to a global level. In June 2019, Ellis traveled to Cannes-Lions, where she spoke about increasing LGBTQ inclusion in marketing and advertising and the workplace on panels with the world’s largest companies. For the past several years, Ellis has also brought LGBTQ issues to the forefront at the World Economic Forum. As an insightful expert on LGBT issues, Ellis has appeared on ABC News, Bloomberg, CNN, MSNBC, Entertainment Tonight, and scores of other broadcasts.

Ellis co-authored a memoir with her wife, Kristen Ellis-Henderson, titled “Times Two, Two Women in Love and the Happy Family They Made," released by Simon & Schuster. They were the first same-sex couple to have their marriage ceremony performed in the Episcopal Church of New York State. Ellis and her wife Kristen are the proud mothers of two adorable children.