Really encourage you to do so. Its fantastic. And we have Copies Available at the registration desk. Without further delay ill get to my panel. Thrilled to have all of you here. Im joined by congresswoman Sherry Bustos who is really a case study i think for democrats in how to succeed in trumpfriendly territory and by representative philip henderson, south carolinas state representative from the greenville area, and last but not least somebody who im sure most of you know if you are watching cable news, amy walter the National Editor of the cook political report. Amy, let me start with you. Reading the New York Times yesterday there we go. Its like they stole your thunder. I saw that anita dunn, who served as Communications Direct ar for president obama, was quoted in a piece about the upsurge of women. Right. Particularly running in democratic primaries. Her response, when asked about this, was to proclaim 2017, and i think 2018, quote, the year of the woman. Yeah. Is she getting ahead of herself as far as the midterm elections are concerned or can we really prepare for an influx of female Office Holders . Thank you eliana, thank you for being here, for inviting me. It is nice. Its not very often that i sit on a stage and look out to a sea of women. Usually, the faces are [ applause ] how often do you look out on a sea of 99 men and then one woman stuck somewhere in there . So its thats a fascinating question on its own. But personally, its also interesting because i came to washington in 1991. I think it was about two weeks before the Clarence Thomas anita hill hearings. And it was literally i just remember the moment when the light sort of switched on and whole bunch of women noticed this all male panel in the Senate Grilling and literally looking down and grilling this africanamerican woman. And it was at that moment, too, where emilys list really went from a small it shot up. We saw in 1992 a Record Number of women win. More women were elected that year than at any point in history, which was a whopping 24 women in the house and five women in the senate. But what we forget about that year, while we talk a lot about it being a reaction to anita hill, 1992 had a couple of things that this year does not have, which was it was a redistricting year. So there were a lot of new seats. And there was a huge scandal which was the House Bank Scandal that year when we learned that many members of Congress Just overdrew their accounts by a lot, and then they got to hide that fact. My favorite wasnt just that they would do that. Many of the men would say, you know, my wife i dont know. She just you know women, they just spend the money. I dont know where it goes. So that so not only did you have a Record Number of women win, you had a record freshman class in 1992. This year, you dont have those two factors, although obviously some of the scandals roiling through its not a house bank its the Sexual Harassment scandaled. Different kind of house bank. Different kind of house bank. You do have an energy, though, that feels similar to 1992 in that the sort of boiling of energy from women voters and weve always seen a gender gap. Democrats doing better among women than republicans do. When you see the favoritability gaps between this is the last wall street journal poll. Trumps approval is 42. Among women it is 3263 in the survey monkey poll 52 disapprove of donald trump. We are living in this intense energy. The New York Times points to a Record Number of women who are interested in running. Many of them are running against each other in primaries. Youll see a Record Number of candidates, not a Record Number of women in office. I think what we saw in virginia as well was in places that are suburban, well educated Like Northern virginia, like suburban denver. It may be the time when we start to see those voters have an influence in the midterms. I was going to can you about the sorts of changes we might see in reaction to some of these scandals. You answered my question. Thanks for that. But i kept going. You plowed right through it. Our politico investigation found that women are as successful in terms of their win rate and they are as successful in terms of fundraising. The problem is that women simply dont run as often as men. Congressman bustos is partly responsible for the recruitment. I was wondering what you found are the most and whether they differ in terms of whats effective for recruiting women and whats effective for recruiting men. It is very different recruiting men in comparison to recruiting women. Ill walk you through a little bit of the scenario. Im still involved with that, mostly focusing on the midwest which is the area from a democratic perspective that we better figure out if we ever want to win back the house. Im in a district for a little more perspective. 14 counties, 7,000 square miles. 11 of the counties are almost entirely rural. Democrats have not exactly done well in rural america. Donald trump won my district. There are 12 in the u. S. House of representatives serving in districts that donald trump won in. I won by 20 points. It was part of that reason that i have my colleague saying what are you doing that is different and how can we help you be successful . I can tell you that the first question a man will typically ask is can i win . Thats usually what you hear first. The first question you usually hear from a woman is how will this impact my family . How do you take all of public criticism thats out there relentlessly and at the level when youre running for congress . Even some times when youll build a little more Comfort Level with some of the candidates they will say theres such a large swath of issues, how can you plannage understanding all of these issues . I have never had a man ask me that question. You dont i have never had a man ask first about the impact on his family. So first of all to successfully recruit women first you to ask. Were you asked to run when you first ran for city council . I was. I was asked and elected to two on a town of 21,000 people. Any illinois people out there . All right. Anybody from down state illinois . One. So it is its completely doable with a lot of convincing because most women have to be asked to run. So i was asked to run for city council and frankly i wouldnt have thought of it. I wouldnt have thought of running. I was asked to run for congress. I would not have thought to run for congress. I had a lot going on that motivated me to run. Phoniness is very apparent in people. It is very apparent. You better have that drive in wanting to make a difference. You talk through how it impacts your family. When we are recruiting a woman with younger children, so when we are recruiting a younger woman who has children i say im going to have grace mang, who is a congresswoman from new york who has two little boys, i will have her give you a call. Grace will tell you the story about how when we are walking from her office to the house floor she is face timing with her kids doing homework with them. She will go back to the room and continue talking to them. We had two sets of votes last night. We went to young chow on penn avenue. A group of us went to dinner last night. Grace had to excuse herself for a little while. Her husband was out of town coming here to go to the White House Christmas ball tonight. She had somebody watching her kids and they were misbehaving. She had to facetime with them. So get somebody to relate to them. Most of you are women in the audience. You know that personal connection and somebody talking you through all of that and the attack ads and how you deal with all of that is what it takes to be successful recruiting women. Thanks so much. Representative henderson, let me turn to you, republicans and women, we have a female candidates but when it comes to republicans they have a serious problem. On the federal level and i know you serve at the state level, but just to give the audience an idea of what we are talking about, republican women comprise just 10 of the how republican conference and its about the same in the senate. There are 5 of 52 republican senators. Why do you think republicans face this problem . We dont see the same sort of split in the voting population. What do you think republicans can do to improve this . The fact is we will never approach parity in terms of representation of women unless we get more female republican elected to office. Right. Thank you so much. Let me ask, do we have any southerners . There we go. We wont talk about college football. Amy and i already chatted about that. I have been serving in an elected office since 2000. I started because i had a mentor. It is different than the congresswoman was talking ability. Women need to step up and say i want to do this. I worked for someone that offered me a job. I said i want to do this. So that was my first office. But the hard part for republicans, being from a red state, everybody is red in the south. And so it is very difficult. A lot of women i was a stay at home mom working part time when i ran. It is a very traditional mind set. I was really surprised though the first time i ran. I was in a very conservative church at the time. I thought these ladies are going to be getting on my case that i should be staying home with my children. I had a woman say you just go. Let me tell you, if i had the opportunity to do whether i was doing when i was younger i would have done it. I thought wow, that is not what i expected. I think that women need to understand that you just need to step up. I think one of the other big challenges is fundraising and money. We dont have the networks that men do to tap into for money, and i will say this. One of the best things you all can do if you dont run is write a check to somebody who is and work. Thats the biggest problem women have is fundraising. I have been fortunate im good at it and i like it. A lot of women candidates arent and thats very difficult, republicans or democrats. We do have a lot of challenges. Thats why i stay involved in order to help republican women run. We have democrats and republicans that have us all represented at the table and have a voice in helping to make things happen and make a difference. Is the fundraising aspect something you can speak to congresswoman . It is tough. Running for congress is it takes a lot of resources. I can tell you that as i look back at my first race i defeated a sitting republican. When youre a challenger running against somebody who is in office it takes a lot of resources. Now as a democratic prochoice woman emilys list was invaluable to me. That is something and not just helping on the fundraising part of it, but as a first time congressional candidate they sent somebody out to help me understand the basics of fundraising. I was doing a lousy job at it. I quit my job. I was Vice President of a health system. My husband is a cop. I was the primary earner in my family. I had quit my job because this is a full time proposition. This is Something Else to think about, how you manage that. Im sitting at home with pictures of my three boys in front of me. I would send off an email to a friend. She comes and watches me and grabs me by my arm, takes me from my desk, sits me down and says you are not going to have your phone and computer in front of you. You will not have your kids picture in front of you. Youll make phone calls and this is how youll do it. All of this Program Available ob on the cspan networks. The House Rules Committee is gaveling in. The chairman Pete Sessions pounding the gavel. They are taking up a bill that would make cob sealed weapons permits effective across state lines. Live coverage here ob cspan 3. Citizens with a state issue conceal to carry. Permit from a a state that does not require a permit can cluz
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