CHARLOTTE, N.C. — North Carolina’s U.S. senator, Kay Hagan, has hired former North Carolina Democratic Party spokesperson Micah Beasley as her new state press secretary.
Beasley replaces Chris Hayden, who is moving to work for Hagan’s re-election campaign.
Beasley, who is openly gay, was the highest ranking LGBT employee at the North Carolina Democratic Party before resigning his position there in February. His departure came amid turmoil over the firing of the party’s former executive director, Robert Dempsey.
Beasley was the state party’s first openly gay spokesperson.
Previously, Beasley worked as the communications director for Linda Coleman’s campaign for lieutenant governor in 2012.
He interned for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, for Hagan’s 2008 campaign and in Hagan’s U.S. Senate office in 2010 while a student at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro. At UNC-Greensboro, he also served in the Student Senate when the school also elected its first openly gay student body president.