WASHINGTON (AP) – The Senate has the potential to make history this fall, with not one, but two black women potentially elected to the chamber. The situation has never been seen in America since Congress was founded more than 200 years ago.
Delaware’s Lisa Blunt Rochester marks the milestone, saying the reason she does this work is not to make history, but to “make a difference, impact people’s lives.”
Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland said people like her and stories like hers don’t usually make it to the U.S. Senate, “but they should.”
If the two Democratic candidates are victorious in November’s election, their arrival would double the number of black women — from two to four — ever elected to the U.S. Senate, which has historically been and still is a majority of 100 members. white men.
Never have two black women served together in the Senate at the same time.
“I have to stop and think how is that possible?” asked Debbie Walsh, director of Rutgers University’s Center on American Women and Politics.
“That’s not to say the perspective of white male lawyers shouldn’t be on the table,” said Walsh, but “they shouldn’t be the only thing on the table.”
There are certainly many steps to climb before Senate history is made in this election, where not only the White House, but control of Congress is hotly contested, and essentially a toss-up. Senate races in particular are hot, grueling and expensive.
Blunt Rochester is all but certain to defeat the Republican nominee after Tuesday’s uncontested primary to replace retiring Democratic Sen. Tom Carper in the small state that is home to President Joe Biden and is the top House representative. But the race in Maryland between Alsobrooks and Republican Larry Hogan, a popular former governor, is expected to be close to the end — and could determine which party wins the Senate majority.
Alsobrooks bucked conventional wisdom to defeat wealthy David Trone in the primary to replace retiring Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin by rallying deep grassroots and party support, displayed in a major campaign ad featuring hundreds of supporters. He is a former state attorney for Prince George’s County expansion and is now its top county executive.
In a private text message thread, Blunt Rochester says she calls herself “the senator’s sister” as they cast a ballot from Vice President Kamala Harris — a friend and colleague who became the second black woman elected to the Senate when she won in 2016 — in her own historic bid for the White House.
The first black woman elected to the Senate, Democratic Senator Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois in 1992, served one term. Harris was the second. And a third black woman, Sen. Laphonza Butler, was appointed in 2023 to fill the term of longtime California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who died.
“People are worried and excited at the same time,” said Glynda C. Carr, president and CEO of Higher Heights for America, an organization that works to elect black women to office.
What’s striking about their campaigns is the way the women embrace their backgrounds but, like Harris, also ignore the historical firsts they bring to the job, leaving it up to voters to see their blackness and hear their voices. ladies.
“The vast majority of us know that we have a lot more in common than what separates us,” Harris said on the debate stage this week, sidestepping Trump when he raised questions about his race.
On the campaign trail, Blunt Rochester has shared the story of Reconstruction-era documents showing an enslaved great-great-grandfather in Georgia who now has the right to vote.
As she looks back on that history, “what we’ve been through as a country,” she said she also thinks about what she’s passing on to her own new baby daughter.
“There’s no fancy way to run” for office, Blunt Rochester told the AP.
Blunt Rochester and Harris are close, both entering Congress the same year and often sitting together at Congressional Black Caucus events. “The most important thing is that we show up as our authentic selves,” he said, adding, “because that requires all of our different and varied life and work experiences.”
Alsobrooks launched her campaign for the Senate with a video that tells her family’s story of leaving South Carolina for Maryland after her great-grandfather was shot by a sheriff’s deputy following a traffic stop.
As a young prosecutor, he first met Harris, who was then California’s attorney general. The friendship was born more than ten years ago.
But unlike 2016, when Hillary Clinton ran for president in a white dress symbolizing the suffragettes, the 2024 Senate candidates are positioning themselves more broadly in a way that may appeal to a wider electorate but also signal a cultural shift as the country becomes more diverse. and Congress reflects more of the electorate.
“We learned from 2016, we’re not going to lead with identity the way Hillary Clinton did,” said Aimee Allison, founder of She the People, an organization that supports women of color in American leadership.
Allison said the new generation of candidates shows you can have “multiple identities” at once. “It shows that you have a heart for people who are not like you … but who deserve to be served and represented by the government.”
The challenges black women face to get to this point in the campaign are steep, rooted in a two-party political system that has often been slow to support black female candidates and quick to doubt their ability to win statewide office despite their qualifications.
Over the years, parties haven’t always allocated ample resources to black female candidates, who strategists said showed they could have done more in several close races, creating a Catch-22 loop that reinforces partisan attitudes against their electability.
In fact, the Senate may be poised to swear in another black woman, Rep. Barbara Lee, who ran for an open seat in California after Feinstein’s death, but was unsuccessful in a multi-candidate primary. Rep. Adam Schiff ran a strong campaign to become the Democratic front-runner with broad party support and is expected to win the seat now temporarily filled by Butler.
With the Senate headed for a 50-50 split, tens of millions of dollars are being spent in Maryland, where Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell recruited the popular Hogan to help the GOP regain the majority.
Hogan and Alsobrooks generally seem to respect each other. Alsobrooks said Hogan was a good governor, but warns that in the Senate, he would be the deciding vote for the GOP.
Hogan’s campaign said he has great respect for Alsobrooks and is proud of the work they did together during his administration.
“Our campaign is laser-focused on Maryland and Marylanders — their local concerns and priorities and the opportunity to choose an independent swing vote that puts the state’s interests ahead of partisan politics,” said Hogan campaign spokesman Blake Kernen. .
During the Democratic National Convention, the two female candidates held an event at the historic Black History Museum in Chicago, where Moseley Braun spoke and Butler introduced them.
Blunt Rochester pointed out his own powder blue power suit with padded soles and said he stands on the shoulders of those who came before him, with strong shoulders ready for those to come.
