Must remove barriers for women in politics, Democrats’ chair says
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the final installment in a continuing series on Women’s History Month for March, when the accomplishments of women and their contributions to history are celebrated in communities across the country and around the globe.
Hayden Shamel, chair of the Democratic Party of Garland County and a former candidate for Arkansas’ 4th Congressional District, says being a woman in politics can be “lonely.”
“I think that’s probably an accurate description for a lot of women who work in politics, simply because we have less representation when it comes
to women, so for example, if you think in terms of the Arkansas state Legislature, we have currently seven females who are in the state Senate, out of a total of 35. That’s 20% representation in the state Senate,” Shamel said.
“On the House side of things, we have 24 females who are representatives out of 100 representatives in the house. So that’s 24%. If you think about Arkansas’s population, according to the last set of data, I believe I’m correct by this number; out of Arkansas’s population, 51.2% of our population is female,” she said.
“I think it’s very important that we find ways to remove some of the barriers and some of the obstacles that I think a lot of women see who may want to get involved in the political process.”
Shamel said she feels for many women in their 30s or 40s, noting it is tough to take on running for anything.
“There’s a lot of similarities in campaigns, no matter what you’re running for, whether you’re running for school board all the way up to the United States Senate,” Shamel said.
“There’s a lot of similarities.
One of the overarching components of a political campaign is having time. I think for a lot of women who are my age, or who are mothers that are raising children, you just don’t have a whole lot of time,” she said.
There is an old saying that “a woman’s work is never done” which is true for many women, Shamel said, noting women wake up at dawn and rather they are a working mother or a stay-at-home mother, they work all day.
“When you work full time, are also a mother, and have kids, you don’t have a whole lot of time. It’s after dark before you can even begin to pursue things,” Shamel said.
“That’s true not just in the political field, but for women who are going back to school or who may be taking night classes,” she said.
“They work during the day, they come home, they fulfill their duties and obligations with their family, and then it’s often dark before they can even begin personal goals for (themselves), whether it’s furthering their education or running for office. Time is a big barrier,”
Shamel said.
Shamel was lucky because when she ran for Congress in 2018 she had two women who served as campaign moms to her daughter, she said, noting, “They took care of my daughter as I traveled because the political campaign takes so much.”
One of the biggest aspects of running for office is to listen to people, to hear their concerns, and to find out what they need, but to do so, candidates have to be present.
“I did a whole lot of traveling to listen to people in all parts of the state to try and hear what the issues were that the community needed helped with essentially,” Shamel said.
“I was incredibly fortunate to have those two women there who were able to kind of step in and serve as kind of a mom to my daughter when I wasn’t there,” she said. “We developed such a close relationship. They did with my daughter. I was very fortunate, but not all women have the same support structure in place.”
Shamel said it is important that women who want to run for office, especially women with children, have avenues and resources available to have that time without sacrificing time with their families.
“I think that’s a pretty big obstacle; time is an obstacle,” she said.
Shamel said it is important for people who run for office to run because they want to make positive change in their communities, not because they’re looking for a position of prestige or power.
“The sad thing is that’s the way our political system is set up today,” she said. “That takes having the gumption to get out there and ask people for money, which is not an easy thing to do.”
Fundraising takes time, and it can be intimidating for firsttime candidates, she said.
“What I think one of the things that we need to do is do a better job of educating and providing support systems (to) women who (are) interested in running for office,” she said. “So, that they can find unique ways to both fundraise and to be available to listen to the people that they want to represent.”