Nobody expected Lake Highlands High School’s 2021 commencement ceremony to draw nationwide attention.
Photography by Jessica Turner
Including Valedictorian Paxton Smith.
After Gov. Greg Abbott signed Texas’ “Heartbeat Bill,” which prohibits most abortions after six weeks without exceptions for rape and incest, into law a few weeks before the graduation ceremony, Smith felt betrayed and disappointed as the news broke on social media.
She had originally intended to give a speech on youth and media — a speech approved by the district. But in the days leading up to the ceremony, she decided to go off script and follow her own. Neighbors, school officials and even her friends had no idea what was coming.
On a muggy May evening at Wildcat-Ram Stadium, Smith approached the podium and thanked her math teacher. She revealed a folded piece of paper from underneath her honors cord-draped robe, took a deep breath, then delivered what would be RISD’s last live commencement speech.
“I have dreams and hopes and ambitions,” she said. “Every girl graduating today does. And we have spent our entire lives working toward our future, and without our input or consent, our control over that future has been stripped away from us. I am terrified that if my contraceptives fail, I am terrified that if I’m raped, then my hopes and aspirations and dreams and efforts for my future will no longer matter.”
As she stepped away from the podium, district staff expressed their disapproval of her last-minute swap. One even mentioned withholding her diploma, although it turned out to be a hollow threat. In 2022, RISD moved to prerecorded commencement addresses.
The public’s response was overwhelmingly positive. A YouTube video of the speech drew hundreds of thousands of views within a week of its posting. CNN and The New York Times picked up the story. Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and comedian Sarah Silverman both took to Twitter (now X) to show their support for Smith.
As a result of the viral speech, Paxton joined the Women’s Reproductive Rights Assistance Project‘s board of directors. WRRAP is the largest nonprofit abortion fund in the U.S. and provides assistance to women seeking reproductive care across 50 states.
“There’s a lot of value to working toward shifting legislation, and I will never discount that. Legislation is what we live under, but WRRAP directly helps people on the ground who are experiencing the problem right now and need the help right now,” she says. “There is somebody in Texas right now who can’t afford an abortion but needs one, WRRAP can help them right then and there. And it feels really great to be part of an organization that can do that.”
Despite her continued advocacy, Smith says she doesn’t see a future in activism. Her mind is on music.
She recently graduated from the University of Texas at Austin, where she participated in Longhorn Singers and Texas Horizons. While attending UT, she gigged around Austin and interned in Los Angeles for Merlin Studios, Campus Studios and Interstate Records. In May, Smith released the first song from her debut EP, entitled “But I Love It.”
“The whole EP is about my coming of age,” she says. “I would say it’s characterized by contradiction by all these technical thoughts, by finding that growing up is more confusing than when I was younger.”
A little more than a year after her infamous speech, the United States Supreme Court issued a 6-3 ruling overturning Roe v. Wade. She may not see herself as an activist anymore, but she’s still staying vigilant and encouraging others to speak out.
“There are a lot of people working really hard to get these rights back and to make sure that people have access to abortion care,” Smith says. “There can always be more that can be done, but I am not critiquing people who are doing the work, just I’m applauding them, and I’m grateful for that, and I hope that more people will get involved.”
