Primary Outlook: Women Candidates in Virginia

Kelly Dittmar

Gender Watch 2018From March to December 2018, the Barbara Lee Family Foundation (BLFF) and the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) partnered to offer Gender Watch 2018, which tracked, analyzed, and illuminated gender dynamics in the 2018 midterm elections. With the help of expert scholars and practitioners, Gender Watch 2018 furthered public understanding of how gender influences candidate strategy, voter engagement and expectations, media coverage, and electoral outcomes in campaigns. The blog below was written for Gender Watch 2018, as part of our collective effort to raise questions, suggest answers, and complicate popular discussions about gender’s role U.S. elections.

 

Ahead of the Virginia primary election on June 12, 2018, we outline the numbers and proportions of women who have filed as candidates for congressional and statewide office. The data below also provide points of historical comparison to give context to today’s presence and potential success of women candidates.

All data are provided from the Center for American Women and Politics, Eagleton Institute of Politics, Rutgers University. For a full list of the women candidates in Virginia primary races for congressional and statewide offices, see CAWP’s Election Watch page.

CONGRESS

Current: 1 of 13 members of the Virginia congressional delegation (7.7%)

**In Virginia, a political party may choose to nominate its candidate using a method other than a primary (e.g. convention, caucus, mass meeting, etc.). The Democratic Party has chosen a convention in the VA-05 and the Republican Party has chosen other methods in VA-03, VA-05, VA-06, VA-07, and VA-08. Of all candidates selected in these districts, just one – Democratic Leslie Cockburn (VA-05) – is a woman. These nominees are not included in the candidate counts in this analysis as they are not on the primary ballot on June 12th.

Filed: 13 (10D, 3R)
Percent of all Filed Congressional Candidates (D/R): 39.4% (13 of 33)

SENATE

Current: 0 of 2 senators

  • No woman has ever represented Virginia in the U.S. Senate.

Filed:  0

  • No women are running to challenge incumbent Senator Tim Kaine (D) in this year’s U.S. Senate election in Virginia.

Percent of all Filed Senate Candidates (D/R):  0% (0 of 4)
Percent of all Filed Democratic House Candidates:  0% (0 of 1)
Percent of all Filed Republican House Candidates: 0% (0 of 3)

HOUSE

Current: 1 of 11 representatives (9.1%)

  • 4 (1D, 3R) women have served in the U.S. House from Virginia, including current Representative Barbara Comstock (R).

Filed:  13 (10D, 3R)

  • Republican incumbent Barbara Comstock (R) is running for re-election.
  • 2 (2D) women are running for the open seat in Virginia’s 6th congressional district.
  • 9 (8D, 1R) women are running to challenge incumbents in the general election.
  • 1 (1R) woman is challenging a Republican incumbent in the primary election.

* Of the 13 women running for the U.S. House, 2 are women of color: Vangie Williams (D-VA01) and Shion Fenty (R-VA04) are both Black women.

Percent of all Filed House Primary Candidates (D/R):  44.8% (13 of 29)
Percent of all Filed Democratic House Primary Candidates:  47.6% (10 of 21)
Percent of all Filed Republican House Primary Candidates: 37.5% (3 of 8)

Recent history: The number of women who filed for major party candidacy for the U.S. House in Virginia in 2018 is greater than any other year between 2008 and 2018.

  • In 2016, when there were 3 open U.S. House seats in Virginia, 7 (5D, 2R) women filed as primary candidates. There are 2 open U.S. House seats in Virginia this year.
  • The number of Democratic women running for the U.S. House in Virginia is double that of any previous high between 2008 and 2016. The same number of Republican women were candidates for the U.S. House in 2010.

THERE ARE NO STATEWIDE EXECUTIVE ELECTIONS IN VIRGINIA THIS YEAR

Kelly Dittmar headshot

Kelly Dittmar

Kelly Dittmar is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Rutgers–Camden and Director of Research and Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics at the Eagleton Institute of Politics. She is the co-author of A Seat at the Table: Congresswomen’s Perspectives on Why Their Representation Matters (Oxford University Press, 2018) (with Kira Sanbonmatsu and Susan J. Carroll) and author of Navigating Gendered Terrain: Stereotypes and Strategy in Political Campaigns (Temple University Press, 2015).

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