California is seeing a historic rise in the number of Black women running for office

Over 50 years ago, Rep. Shirley Chisholm ran for U.S. president, refusing to let racism and sexism circumscribe her role in leading our country toward achieving its ideals. 

“If they don’t give you a seat at the table,” she urged Black women and others who have been excluded from power, “bring a folding chair.”

In the intervening decades, progress has been too slow. There are no Black women serving as governor, just one U.S. senator, and the lack of representation continues in Congress and in statehouses nationwide. But there are signs of significant breakthroughs, and California is spurring a new wave of Black women’s leadership that will send ripples of change through our state and nation.

As Californians cast their ballots for the March primary, more voters across the state will be able to choose a Black woman to represent them. Never before have so many Black women run competitive races – in districts without a Black majority. At least 24 are running for the Legislature, and 10 are being backed by the Legislative Black Caucus. To put this in perspective, there have only been 21 Black caucus members in California history.

If all of these candidates win, the caucus would nearly double in size. 

We believe that voters are tired of business as usual in politics – tired of division and, most of all, tired of inequality stemming from the racial and economic status quo.

At the same time, Black organizations, leaders and networks, as well as movements for social change, have fostered a new wave of Black women stepping up as community leaders. Groups like the CA Black Women’s Collective, Black Women Organized for Political Action and the LA African American Woman PAC have been actively developing Black women to help them step into leadership positions.

Simultaneously, a growing number of Black women in the labor movement and in racial justice movements have been driven to carry that leadership into elected office. And Black women leaders have been a bedrock of encouragement and mentorship, notably county Supervisor Holly Mitchell and Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove in Los Angeles. 

A wide array of experiences and perspectives shape this community, including many that the electorate is hungry for. We are uniters. We build bridges. We see the worth and dignity of every person – and we know how far our society falls short of recognizing that worth and acting on it. We know that inequality did not come about by accident or as a “natural” fact but was created through structures, policies and laws – and that to address it requires more than “conversation.”

It requires action in the form of structural change.

The distress and dislocation of the pandemic fundamentally shifted the politics of our country. The formation of the MAGA identity has been much remarked on, yet there is another shift that has happened outside of that minority of voters. People want change – to our rigged economic rules, to our divided society and to the increased expression of inhumanity and disrespect.

More and more, they see that the answer lies in leaders who have dedicated themselves to exactly these changes: Black women. 

Voters know that Black women believe in American democracy. By voting in record numbers, this community saved our society from a second Trump term that would have destroyed it.

Voters know that Black women see the crisis of homelessness not as an aesthetic or hygienic crisis on our streets, but as a crisis of our humanity and our ability to see the uncles, cousins and children who are in dire need of lifting up.

Voters see candidates who have been working for years to unite Black and brown neighborhoods to fight poverty, and they trust those candidates. They trust us to work hard, build bridges and fight for a more inclusive, just and humane society.

With voters’ confidence in our leadership, Black women in California will not only be bringing our chairs, we will be setting the table for a stronger state and brighter future for all.