In the months leading up to the presidential election, many public figures such as Bryce Dallas Howard, Nina Dobrev, and Vanessa Hudgens have used their social media platforms to encourage people to vote in the upcoming election.

Typically, adults encourage people to vote, but one minor who has gotten an increasing amount of attention over the past few months for expressing political opinions is Claudia Conway.

The 16-year-old daughter of American political consultant Kellyanne Conway has taken a very overt approach to express her liberal views, despite the predominantly conservative views of her family.

Conway has over 1.5 million followers and 50.8 million likes on TikTok, the popular social media app that is primarily used by minors and young adults. In the “biography” section of her account she has a direct link leading to a voting website, as well as a blue heart in her biography symbolizing Joe Biden—a Democrat.

In spite of backlash, the teenager still continues to raise her voice above the disapproval from her family and her critics.

Before Conway’s recent fame, she lived a quiet life with her family. She would often make videos on TikTok when it was formerly known as music.ly.

In an interview with Insider Conway said, ” I grew up in a very very conservative family, so I was only exposed to those views for a very long time.”

Because of this, it is natural to imagine that kids like Conway who grow up in a “far-left” or “right” family would either absorb their ideas as their own, or rebel against them.

According to her TikTok account, on June 20 she posted a video with with her friends, holding up signs to support the Black Lives Matter Movement.

Not exactly the most right-winged organization.

If that wasn’t enough, her caption also featured a saying often used amongst young adults to condemn cops, “ACAB,” meaning “all cops are bad.”

Less than a month after that post, Conway announced to the public that her mother will be placing a social media ban on her due to a livestream of her bashing her parents about their political views.

In the last tweet Conway released before her temporary ban she said, “My parents are forcing me to delete social media… apparently, i don’t have a platform! it’s fake!” This apparent ban only lasted about a week, and she made her great debut through TikTok when she came back.

After Conway’s absence, she continued to push her views while shaming and exposing her family’s through Twitter and TikTok.

She also made several posts educating viewers on policies that are put in place in order to oppress minorities in particular. For example, on July 20, she made a post advocating to end performative activism and qualified immunity.  These posts now have over 200,000 views, but at the time they were only taken as seriously as a naive young girl rebelling against her parents.

Conway’s account started to get more publicity when she began exposing her parent’s beliefs towards the LGBTQ community.

In the TikTok she said, “Just found out my dad is pro life and very conservative and likes capitalism… stop saying you stan my dad please.”

She went on to further expose her parents in the comments: “My parents have also been very openly homophobic and transphobic literally shut up about the Lincoln Project.”

The post received over 1.2 million views and almost 200,000 likes.

Although it is easy to see that this post got so much attention because she was exposing her parents with little fear or shame, teenagers around the world related to her situation as the “black sheep” of the family with different political views. Above all, the relatability that teenagers in particular felt to Conway’s situation is what led her to becoming an influential public figure in a little over two months.

Conway is never hesitant to show a more vulnerable side of her through her TikTok account by openly talking about the emotional and mental abuse that she has allegedly faced by her family.  Because of this, it wasn’t very surprising when Conway announced in late August that she was seeking emancipation from her parents.

Conway’s fans were quick to support her decision. In the end, her mother ended up stepping down from her position as Counselor to the President to build a better bond with her daughter. As of now, Conway still lives at home with her mother and has been reserved about the state of their relationship, but her Tik Tok account continued to prosper.

Conway quickly went from being a small social media figure with a few viral videos on TikTok, to consistently getting over five to seven million views on her post when she predicted that she and her mother had COVID. Early October Conway posted several videos saying that her mother has been coughing around the house, and Conway was having a hard time breathing. Later that day Conway posted an update confirming her and her mother had COVID.

Conway’s fans offered her a lot of support, but her fans also identified a great sense of irony because Conway’s mother works for Donald Trump, who has publicly downplayed the severity of the virus.

Even Conway herself posted a video saying, “I [sic] don’t wish ill on anyone but baby.. the irony.”

Being a public figure, especially one who has famous parents, one could imagine that entertainment news sources would be quick to make stories about Conway.

This was exactly the case whenever Conway’s 16th birthday party seemed to have violated the COVID guidelines that have been put in place to keep people in this country safe, but what set Conway over the edge was Perez Hilton making fun of her in one of her TikToks about her problematic birthday party.

Conway made a six-part explanation as to what happened to her party and why it wasn’t her fault.  Seventeen Magazine, made a story explaining what happened regarding Conway’s birthday party.

Conway took a very nonchalant approach to the situation by implying through the videos that you can believe whatever you want to believe; however, Conway believed her line was crossed when Perez Hilton, blogger and media personality, posted a video of making fun of a post that was only meant for Conway’s friends regarding mental health and suicide shortly after her birthday scandal.

“I posted this video yesterday to my friends only, and Perez Hilton reposted it making fun of me, and the post had to do with, trigger warning, suicidality, and the comments are all like, Oh what you’re going to kill yourself for throwing a party?” Conway said.

She then went on to say that this post was made to get support from her friends, but adults took advantage of the opportunity by making Conway their target.

Dextero.com posted a story regarding Conway’s feud with Hilton after his post that made fun of Conway’s post about her mental health struggles.

Conway continues to use her account as a way to expose, educate, and express in spite of all the hate she receives on a daily basis.

Whether people agree with Conway’s philosophies on politics or not, she is begging them to make their voices heard through voting. One of Conway’s priorities is to ensure people learn about—according to her—the negative effects that Trump and his administration have on the world.

No matter how “problematic” others may see her, she is using her platform to promote a message that many kids are not giving any thought towards.

Conway is determined to spread her message as far as possible. She may have to deal with hate, but she has continuously proven that her voice will not be silenced.