This year, Congress has a record number of women members. Out of 540 members, can you guess how many are women?
You might think somewhere close to 50%, but you'd be far off. In the House, it's just 128 members (29%!!), and in the Senate, only 25 members (25%!!!).
And the number of Black women in Congress? Including Summer, the 118th Congress has a *record number* of 28 Black women serving in the House — and none in the Senate. In fact, only 23 states have ever elected a Black woman to Congress.
Globally, only 29 countries have reached 40% or more women in parliament. At the current rate of progress, gender parity in national legislative bodies will not be achieved before 2063.1
Today, on International Women's Day, we're celebrating Summer's historic win to become PA's first Black Congresswoman and calling for our places of power to look like our communities.
In Congress, Summer is working tirelessly to break down barriers and fight for the Black, brown, and working-class communities who've never been represented by our democracy. If you're with Summer, will you chip in $5 or more to help advance this effort?
Black women decide elections, yet systemic barriers continuously keep Black women out of political power in the U.S. From the countless sums of money spent attacking progressive Black and brown women, to the party bosses themselves, our system undermines Black women — and in turn, hurts our party and our country.
Then, if a Black woman is able to succeed in breaking these concrete ceilings, she is met with implicit biases and microaggressions. These are the real impediments that women, Black women, and working-class people have to breaking into politics.
Our identities are integral to our legislation and our advocacy. It is because of Summer's identity and background that she knows just how important it is that we enact a Green New Deal, union protections, racial equity, reproductive justice, and more.
Our work is to change our systems and institutions so that we elect leaders who represent their communities and can make it easier for those leaders to make the change we need.
Thank you,
Team Summer
