Gender, Race and Money in Politics: Campaigning as a Woman

Join OpenSecrets for a panel discussion on the glass ceiling in US electoral politics. Panelists will discuss the challenges that campaigning presents for underrepresented candidates, the variables that create obstacles for women, especially women of color, to lead successful campaigns, and what happens when women win and are elected to office. We’ll speak with research experts, candidate recruiters, advocates, and journalists about the systemic barriers that exist for women running for office and how they will inform those trying to elect a more representative body of government.

View the event schedule and our outstanding lineup of speakers below. Registration is free. This panel is made possible with support from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.

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Schedule

Welcome | 11:00 a.m. ET

Grace Haley, Gender and Race Researcher, OpenSecrets

Panel discussion: Campaigning as a Woman | 11:05 a.m. ET

A'shanti F. Gholar, President of Emerge America and Founder of The Brown Girls Guide to Politics™

Jennifer Pierotti Lim, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Republican Women for Progress

Kira Sanbonmatsu, Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University and Senior Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics at the Eagleton Institute of Politics

Mariel Padilla, Reporter at the 19th* News

Moderator: Sarah Bryner, Director of Research & Strategy, OpenSecrets

Registration

To participate, you must register by 10:00 a.m. ET on June 14. All registered participants will receive an email with instructions on how to connect to our virtual event over Zoom.

Questions

If you have further questions, please contact us at development@crp.org.

**PRESENTERS**

A’shanti F. Gholar serves as the president of Emerge, the only organization dedicated to recruiting and training Democratic women to run for office. In this role, she leads the organization and steers its overall strategy and direction, overseeing a national staff as well as affiliates across the country. For 15 years, A’shanti has been a grassroots organizer and activist for women, communities of color and progressive causes. She has experience in building coalitions, program development and community and political engagement. Prior to coming to Emerge, A’shanti worked at the Democratic National Committee, United Way Worldwide, as a political appointee in the Obama Administration, and at the 2012 Democratic National Convention Committee. A’shanti was recognized as one of She The People’s 20 women of color in politics who will play an impactful role in the 2020 elections and beyond. She is also the founder of The Brown Girls Guide to Politics, which was named one of the top political podcasts by TIME Magazine and Marie Claire.

Jennifer Pierotti Lim is the Founder and Executive Director of Republican Women for Progress and was previously the Founder of Republican Women for Hillary. Jennifer was invited to speak on the closing night of the 2016 Democratic National Convention, where she addressed a television audience of close to 33 million people. She regularly appears on outlets including CNN, MSNBC, BBC, and PBS and her written work has been featured in the New York Times, Huffington Post, and The Hill. She has also guest lectured at The George Washington University and Georgetown University on politics, health care reform, and lobbying. In 2019, Jennifer and her team were finalists in the Professional Women in Advocacy awards for their work with The Campaign School at Yale training women to run for public office. Previously, Jennifer was the Director of Health Policy in the Labor, Immigration, and Employee Benefits Division at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce where she handled health care issues affecting employers and health sector members of the Chamber, in addition to researching and developing the Chamber’s overall policy on health care reform. She also served on the U.S. Senate Committee on Business and Entrepreneurship under Olympia Snowe and worked in Altria’s legislative affairs office. A 2010 graduate of The Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law, Jennifer received her B.A. in public interest policy from the University of Mary Washington in 2007. She is a member of the District of Columbia Bar and the Junior League of Washington, and currently lives in Washington, D.C. with her husband Tim, daughter Penny, son Tim, and dog Pierce.

Kira Sanbonmatsu is a Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University and Senior Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) at the Eagleton Institute of Politics. Her research interests include gender, race/ethnicity, parties, public opinion, and state politics. Her most recent book, coauthored with Kelly Dittmar and Susan J. Carroll, is A Seat at the Table: Congresswomen's Perspectives on Why Their Presence Matters (Oxford University Press, 2018). She is also the coauthor (with Susan J. Carroll) of More Women Can Run: Gender and Pathways to the State Legislatures (Oxford University Press, 2013). Sanbonmatsu coauthored the CAWP reports The Money Hurdle in the Race for Governor (2020), Representation Matters: Women in the U.S. Congress (2017), Poised to Run: Women's Pathways to the State Legislatures (2009). She is also the author of Where Women Run: Gender and Party in the American States (University of Michigan Press, 2006) and Democrats, Republicans, and the Politics of Women's Place (University of Michigan Press, 2002). Her articles have appeared in such journals as Political Research Quarterly and Politics, Groups, and Identities.

Mariel Padilla is a General Assignment Reporter for The 19th*. Previously she covered breaking news at The New York Times as an inaugural fellow, compiled data for an international investigation at the Toni Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism and contributed to a Pulitzer Prize-winning project at The Cincinnati Enquirer.

Sarah Bryner is the Director of Research and Strategy at OpenSecrets. She joined OpenSecrets' the Center for Responsive Politics in 2011 and is responsible for overseeing the center's data analysis and research collaborations. Previously, she was OpenSecrets's lobbying and revolving door researcher. Prior to joining OpenSecrets, Sarah was a doctoral student at the Ohio State University, where she also taught undergraduate political science courses. Her dissertation, "Politicians Behaving Badly: The Determinants and Outcomes of Political Scandal in Post-Watergate America," incorporates both original data collection and political experiments. She received her Ph.D. from Ohio State in 2014 and her B.A. in political science and biology in 2006.

Grace Haley is the Gender and Race Researcher at the Center for Responsive Politics/OpenSecrets in Washington, DC., and works as a freelance researcher for ProPublica and the Associated Press. She studies the intersections of identity and campaign finance, focusing on how women navigate politics as donors, voters, candidates, and lawmakers. The data gathered and analyzed by Grace and the Center for Responsive Politics has been cited in major broadcast, radio, and online media, including the New York Times, NPR, the Washington Post, FiveThirtyEight, CNN, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, Fox News, and other news outlets.