To be sure, people might have simply preferred the former mayor’s widow to Jess. But if people were, in fact, turned off by her gender identity, Jess has a theory for why it might have cost her the election. People are, at their core, good, or at least decent. Even the most ardent transphobe doesn’t want to confront a trans individual with their hatred face-to-face. But, put those same people behind a keyboard, or send them to the privacy of a voting booth, where they don’t have to talk to or look at anyone different, where it’s just them and their worst thoughts, “that’s when the ugly comes out,” she said.

In psychology, “wanting things to be the way they’ve always been” is called “system justification,” and in studies, people who are more prone to system justification are more likely to oppose affirmative action and other equality-promoting policies.79 In Jess’s case, some voters might have noticed that there are not many transgender people leading Texas, and concluded that Jess shouldn’t be, either. Norms trap us in the status quo, even when the status quo is irrational.

What’s more, norm violations bother us more when they affect us personally.80 Someone throwing trash in an entryway of an apartment building would irritate the building’s residents more than someone littering on a street across town. Perhaps some people thought Jess could be transgender if she wanted, but she couldn’t represent the entire town while doing it.

One burly man who rode a Harley Davidson came to a city council meeting and told Jess, “I don’t care what you do on your own time. Just keep doing your job.” She was happy to hear it—until she found he had written “nasty stuff” about her later online.

“Most of the time that people do that kind of thing, it’s because they’re afraid, because they don’t understand, they don’t know me, and I’m different, and different scares people,” she told me.

There might be other reasons Jess lost. Unlike many people here, she supports gun control and is pro-choice. Though she’s not a vocal Democrat, in our interview she referred to the 2016 election as a “disaster.” She was on the news a lot, which is not really a good thing in New Hope. She was a norm violator in more ways than one.

Despite the recent election loss, Jess remained upbeat throughout the evening we spent together. She was about to leave for a leadership course at Harvard, and she planned to run for public office again.