During the 2020 Congressional election, the campaign costs broke records once again, increasing from the $5.72 billion spent in 2018 to an estimated $7.52 billion in 2020; and, the cost of running as a non-incumbent woman was no different. A total of $443 million was spent by the 229 non-incumbent women candidates during the 2020 Congressional election cycle; only 27 have won and will be members of the 117th Congress.

A mother greets her daughters at their school in Tulsa on Nov. 9. (Mike Simons/AP)

The coronavirus has laid bare what was painfully clear to many families already: The caregiving system in the United States is broken, and it is women who are paying the price.

Even before the pandemic began, child-care and long-term care solutions were often unaffordable and inaccessible, and women were filling the gaps at tremendous cost to their own economic potential.

Now, with child-care centers closed, schools operating remotely and families caring for sick adults and aging parents at home, what was previously untenable has become almost impossible — especially for single mothers, essential workers and others working low-wage jobs with unpredictable hours.

While the U.S. celebrates our first ever woman Vice President, Kamala Harris, and a record number of women and women of color in the 117th Congress, gender parity and equality continues to be out of reach. RepresentWomen’s 2020 Gender Parity Index shows the more detailed and complex truth about women’s political representation in the United States. A truth that shows while the media celebrates historic wins for women, representation and legislative power continues to lag across the country.

Dear friends,

Sara Ahmed is a freshman at American University with an intended major in Political Science and Sociology. Being a communications intern at Represent Women has helped her put her passion for gender equality, specifically in the political field, into action. She hopes to work on campaigns where women of color who look like her are running for public office in the future. Sara enjoys trying different places to eat and watching psychological thrillers in her free time.

My name is Sarika Walia, I am currently a senior Public Health Sciences major at the University of Maryland and am matriculating into an accelerated Master’s program in Health Equity this coming summer. I have worked in advocacy my whole life, creating the first Students for Social Justice Club at my high school, helping organize protests in D.C. and involving myself in research that focuses on women and cardiovascular health since most breakthroughs have been focused on men for the past century. Once I finish my Master’s, I hope to work on Women’s reproductive health in developing countries like India. 

My name is Rose Teszler, I’m a rising Junior at Swarthmore College, and I was born and raised in the Boston area. From my underclassman years at Swarthmore, I have mostly learned that I have no idea what I want to do with my life. I count successfully evading the major declaration form as a significant achievement as I continue to deliberate on my love of STEM and my passion for Global Studies. 

My name is McKayla Wenner and I am from Green Bay, Wisconsin. I am a senior at Georgetown University majoring in Government and English and minoring in Spanish, and I will be working as a research intern for RepresentWomen this fall.

My name is Lexi Long, and I am a 2020 graduate of Lafayette College in Easton, PA. As an International Affairs and German Double Major with a Minor in Women and Gender Studies, I was afforded a wide range of opportunities to broaden my knowledge of international politics, language and culture, and how our global societal structure reinforces systematic inequality. During my study abroad experiences in both Germany and Denmark, two countries who have addressed various inequities in their political and economic spheres, I discovered that the United States has only just begun to change the discourse surrounding this narrative.