Record number of women for Congress
More than 100 women were projected to bag seats in the House of Representatives
More than 100 women were projected to win seats in the House of Representatives, easily shattering the record. Overwhelmingly, they were Democrats who helped the party take control of the chamber.
Women have never held more than 84 of the 435 seats in the House. By 1am yesterday as the votes were still being counted, 85 had already been declared winners.
“Women made history in a number of ways and were a significant force in flipping many districts from red to blue,” said Kelly Dittmar, a political scientist at the Centre for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University.
Many of the winning candidates campaigned on the need for better health care for all Americans. They come from a wide variety of backgrounds — from military veterans to teachers — and many had never run for office before.
Women made inroads in gubernatorial races, too, which are important because of the upcoming redistricting battles. In Kansas and Michigan, women flipped states that had been under GOP control. A record 33 of the Tuesday’s matchups for Congress were women vs. women. In Florida, Democrat Donna Shalala, the former president of the University of Miami and Cabinet member in the Clinton administration, defeated Republican Maria Elvira Salazar, a broadcast journalist, of Cuban heritage, according to early results.
“Are women fired up? That is putting it mildly,” said Jen Cox, a founder of PaveItBlue. Her group connected thousands of Atlanta-area women interested in becoming more politically active. “It’s historic,” Cox said.
Gretchen Whitmer, a former state senator in Michigan, won her race after campaigning on a promise to fix the state’s roads and ageing drinking water infrastructure, and to expand Medicaid to lower-income adults.
Notably, Michigan Democrats selected a woman for every statewide office on Tuesday’s ballot: governor, US senator, attorney-general and secretary of state.
Georgia had the most highprofile governor’s race, with Stacey Abrams, a Democrat backed by former president Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey, was aiming to be the first black female governor in the nation. But she was trailing behind Trump-backed candidate Brian Kemp, Georgia’s secretary of state.