AMERICASPolitics

Record Number Of Women in The United States Congress

At least 131 women will serve in Congress in 2021, according to News Wise.

The Woman Post | Carolina Rodríguez Monclou

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The figure surpasses the previous record of 127 women set in 2019. In fact, "more women will join the Republican ranks of the House in the next Congress for the first time in a single election," says Bloomberg Markets and Finance.

Another record reached is 106 women elected to the House so far compared to 102 established in 2019. On the other hand, 25 women will serve in the Senate as it is now, which is a shortfall from last year's figure, which was 26.

Women advanced in Congress. Yet even with this record number of women in Congress, there will still be less than 30 percent of women represented in this position. There is still work to do. Republicans have lagged Democratic women in numbers.

The 2020 U.S. presidential election has done a lot to bring women up a bit in numbers, but it's something Republicans must build on for sure.

Votes were cast along gender lines in this election. Was it more to do with cities, suburbs, and rural demographics than gender?

The 2019 midterm elections saw a record number of women winning seats in the United States House of Representatives. In 2018, there were 84 women representatives before the elections, while in 2019, there were at least 95, the vast majority of them being Democrats.

Also read: THE IMPORTANCE OF MINORITY COMMUNITIES FOR POLITICAL PARTIES

The women's victories came in the wake of the #MeToo movement and the election of Donald Trump that sparked women's marches across the United States. This also motivated many women to run for the position for the first time like Jahana Hayes.

Hayes became the first black Democrat from Connecticut to win a House seat. There were many other firsts on election night: Two Democratic candidates, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib became the first Muslim women in Congress.

Sharice Davids and Deb Haaland became the first representatives of the Native Americans. Sylvia García and Verónica Escobar, both Democrats, became the first Hispanic women in the state of Texas to go to the House.

At 29, New York's Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez became the youngest woman in Congress. Republican women also had some victories: Tennessee elected its first female senator. At this time, most of the new female representatives were more liberal, diverse, and critical of Trump's policies.

CAWP Director Debbie Walsh told News Wise: "The representation of women in American politics has been, through struggle and persistence, on a long, if occasionally uneven, upward trajectory. With all that progress, at best, women will still represent less than 30 percent of Congress in 2021. "

Then, she added, "the 2018 cycle was a Democratic success story; this year we see significant progress on the Republican side. Advances for women must come from both sides of the aisle for them to achieve equitable representation in Congress."

Women from the Afro community were especially involved in this campaign. According to Bloomberg Markets and Finance, they were a vital component of the Democratic Party. An area of ​​strength for the Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris, who becomes the first black person to be elected to the position.

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