State Voices

When I look for gatekeepers…it’s white women. Your gatekeepers are white women. Look at every organization…any program that trains people how to run for office is run by white women. …It’s like we have to prove to the white women and not necessarily that they are holding office. They are running these spaces that become key when you want to run for office. …Going back to infrastructure, where will Latinas go? Where do we go? Anything Latino or Hispanic is run by Latino men and…[we] might as well go with the white women and give them the sense of the white savior. …And to them, sometimes it feels like we’re some sort of charity work to help a Latina that wants to run for office. …And then you walk into these spaces and [there’s a] disconnection. …They just don’t understand how the system works for us, Latinos and immigrants. …[It] goes back to what does [the] infrastructure look like for Latinas or for women of color? …It’s almost like I have to put up with [white-women-led organizations] if I want to run for office because they put it like ‘the sisterhood.’ We have each other’s back, we help each other. …So yes, they have a board that…looks diverse but it’s still white women teaching women of color how to be leaders in our community."

If [party leaders] were going to come out and run a bunch of white men, that would just be completely unacceptable to everyone."

There’s racism in the legislature. There’s racism within the lobbying groups where they’re like, ‘I don’t like that legislation.’ And you’re like, ‘How is it different that [a white woman is] carrying it? Is it less threatening?…We’re seen as it’s a threat to carry legislation that moves the needle for minority communities. And it’s insane that that can even be the case….More often than not, I feel like they would like to crush my courage. …I don’t like having to negotiate what I believe…But there were so many moments that I would have went against the grain and I didn’t and I should have because I went home feeling bad that I didn’t."

Women candidates [have] been successful in our mayoral races…so women have seen other women running and being successful and I think that has encouraged them. I’m a big proponent that women have followed this role model [approach] and I think in Georgia we’ve seen that, particularly over this last decade, where women have taken on some leadership roles in the General Assembly."

One [of the contributors to gains in women’s political representation] is a demographic shift in Georgia [where] we have a lot of people who have moved into metro Atlanta. So you see the gains that women have made in the legislature [are] particularly in the metro Atlanta-area seats. And I think that’s been brought on because our metro Atlanta demographic growth is really focused, and has been, on a little bit more of a higher income and really well-educated individuals who have moved in. And I think they have found some comfort level with different voices being involved in our political sphere."

A lot of our local party organizations have women involved but they haven’t always promoted or encouraged women to run for a lot of those local offices. That is shifting a little bit more as we get some women in some local Republican county party organizations where they are promoting that. But historically that’s been the case. It was definitely male-dominated and thus they kind of selected their friends to run for a lot of those offices."

And then you got these Gen Xers and Millennial women…they have crowns on their heads and I’m not saying that to be facetious or anything, but they know what their worth is. They are queens. They know for a fact that they have voices and they are letting them come out of their mouths and from deep down in their throats. So I think that’s why we’re seeing more women involved in politics."

It’s not that these men hate women. It’s that they hate these women that are trying to be in charge of things."

I think the biggest gap to me is that we don’t have…organizations that specifically recruit Black women, Latinx women, Asian women, and Native women. …And, you know, within Sally’s List we have initiatives…they’re doing stuff to do that. But I think that in order for it to really be successful, it needs to be its own standalone thing. …So whether it’s its own thing or maybe if there was capacity within Sally’s List to have standing initiatives or standing committees that are only…really to recruit and train Black women, only to recruit and train Native women, and that type of thing. …I know that they want to do some of that. But…where do we build those relationships and get to that trust? I think that’s just something that’s lacking. [Interview conducted in December 2021 before Benjamin became Board President of Sally’s List.]"

In the Republican Party, there’s not that many [electoral] opportunities simply given the map. I mean it’s really, really hard. …But it’s hard to get, or has been hard to get, women, much less women of color or ethnic women, to run in the Republican primary because there’s just not that many opportunities."

I know the House Republicans, [we] were always involved in looking for candidates and we love to have women. The problem is…a lot of times [women] don’t want to do it or they don’t pass the litmus tests that are now being imposed."

You need the decision-makers to include women without a doubt. That is the whole keg. It’s not just to be in the body. It’s not to be freshmen. It’s to be in leadership."