Katherine Baird speaking at the Resilience Summit

Katherine Baird looks put together. She’s the minister of congressional, public and governmental affairs at the Canadian Embassy. She stands tall, shoulders back and eyes ahead. Last Thursday, she addressed a room of over fifty high-achieving young women: “I am failing right now,” she said.

The 2018 primaries have hit a bit of a lull this July. From April to June of this year, 31 states and the District of Columbia voted in primary elections to choose their candidates for the November midterm elections. The next statewide party primaries aren’t until the first week of August when Tennessee and Michigan cast their ballots.

#WomenToWatch is a series by RepresentWomen that documents rising women leaders and their stories.

Debra (Deb) Haaland may well become the first Native American congresswoman in United States history come November. This June, she defeated Damon Martinez to win the Democratic primary in the race for New Mexico’s 1st Congressional District. Right now, the district is represented by Michelle Lujan Grisham, who is running for governor and is currently New Mexico’s only woman in Congress. 

The RepresentWomen interns had the distinct pleasure of speaking with former state senator Mary Margaret Whipple last week, who served for many years in the Virginia Senate for the 31st district. Senator Whipple became the first woman to hold a leadership position in the Virginia General Assembly when she was elected Chairwoman of the Senate Democratic Caucus. Prior to serving in the General Assembly, she was on the Arlington School Board and the Arlington County Board. During her time in office, she was instrumental in passing environmental protection measures and was also active in housing and education reform efforts.

In both the United States and Mexico, 2018 has been called “the year of the woman,” an inspiring phrase based on the surges of female political activism across the globe. Despite using the same battle cry, the electoral landscapes for women in the two countries are drastically different: according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union’s measurement of women’s representation in parliament, the US ranks 102nd internationally, while Mexico ranks a striking 9th. Such an incredible gap cannot be simply explained by only one factor; however, Mexico’s mandatory gender quotas for political parties, along with a combination of proportional and winner-take-all districts, are indelibly crucial components, offering insightful lessons for visibly urgent change in the US.

Mexico has a history of legal support for parity in politics, but their most comprehensive and successive initiative has been the 2014 law requiring parties to ensure that 50% of candidates are female. Now, four years later, 42.5% of the lower house of Congress is female, an astounding number on par with Scandinavian countries. For contrast, the percentage of women in the US House of Representatives is not even 20%.

Claudia Sheinbaum, the first elected female mayor of Mexico City         

Photo Credit: Express UK

#WomenToWatch is a series by RepresentWomen that documents rising women leaders and their stories.

Alabama holds primary runoff elections on July 17th, and Republicans will vote for their Lieutenant Governor nominee alongside a few House races. Women are few and far between in Alabama politics — Alabama receives a D in this year’s Gender Parity Index — but not so in this year’s race for governor and lieutenant governor. Kay Ivey, the Republican gubernatorial incumbent, won her primary handily and is a heavy favorite to win reelection in the deep-red state. The upcoming Republican primary runoff will decide if Twinkle Cavanaugh, the President of the Public Service Commission of Alabama and former chairwoman for the Alabama Republican Party, will appear with Ivey on the November ballot.

Mayor of San Juan Carmen Yulín Cruz, Getty

In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, Carmen Yulín Cruz, the mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico, rose to the national stage by repeatedly challenging the Trump administration over its emergency response. Cruz later was named on the 100 Most Influential People List of 2018 by TIME. In a glowing article accompanying her placement on the list, Puerto Rican-born actor Benicio del Toro described Cruz as a “voice of the disenfranchised citizens.” Between Cruz and Guamanian Representative Madeleine Bordallo, who has spoken up about the threat her territory faces from North Korea’s nuclear program, women politicians from the U.S. territories are making a splash in the news. These women are boldly standing up for their communities and people are taking notice. Beyond the headlines, women politicians are still woefully underrepresented in the territories.