2018 Holds Record Number of Women Candidates -- At All Levels

The numbers of women candidates running for office at the federal, state and local levels in 2018 are unprecedented and far exceed the 2016 election cycle.

2018-09-Susan-Ellis-Wild_PA_Twitter.jpg

Though women are largely underrepresented in local government, according to a Mirya Holman in the 2017 journal article, Women in Local Government, some say the future of local government is women.

According to The Hill, that future could be changing this year with record numbers running for office in 2018.

Both major parties have nominated at least 3,260 women in the 46 states holding state legislative elections, pending final tallies in states where races have not yet been called.

In the 2016 election cycle, there were 2,649 female nominees.

“The trigger that launched this juggernaut that we’ve been seeing is the election of Donald Trump,” said Deborah Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, adding:

If they wanted to have elected officials who looked like them and sounded like them, they needed to be the candidate.”

Andrea Fox is Editor of Gov1.com and Senior Editor at Lexipol. She is based in Massachusetts.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU