It’s primary day in both New Jersey and Virginia, and in both states, voters are headed to the polls to send candidates to November’s general elections for statewide and state legislative offices. New Jersey is voting for its full legislature in today's primary, while Virginia is holding elections for just its lower chamber. In the 2019 off-year elections, women set records as general election candidates for both the New Jersey General Assembly, the lower house of New Jersey’s legislature, and the Virginia General Assembly, which is the full state legislative body of Virginia.

Full lists of candidates for statewide and state legislative offices are available at our 2021 Women Candidates page. In Virginia, which has never had a woman governor, two women are among the candidates vying for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in a race CAWP is following closely. Stay tuned to CAWP on Twitter for preliminary results from the 2021 primaries in Virginia and New Jersey ahead of our full results and analysis.

Cherry Hill, New Jersey Mayor Susan Shin Angulo sat down for a CAWP Q&A recently to discuss our new data resource on women in municipal offices. “Deliberate and resilient action to affect change at the local level can ensure our elected officials are truly representative of the communities they serve,” Mayor Shin Angulo told the CAWP team. “However, we must also continue the momentum at the national level and take an honest look at systemic racism, sexism, and xenophobia throughout every institution in this country, and we must persistently confront it head-on. This will take years if not decades, but our nation will be stronger for it.” Read the full piece on the CAWP blog and learn more about women in local office at our Women in Municipal Office fact sheet.

CAWP Senior Scholar Kira Sanbonmatsu joins a virtual panel discussion held by OpenSecrets on Monday, June 14th at 11am ET to elaborate on her work researching campaign finance and women as recipients and donors. The panel 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. Learn more about the event and register to attend here, and read the first report in the CAWP Women, Money, and Politics series, The Money Hurdle in the Race for Governor.

We were unable to host our Women of Power annual networking reception due to the ongoing COVID crisis, but we still had an amazing show of support for CAWP programs through our Women of Power fundraising initiative. We gratefully acknowledge the generosity of the Women of Power Host Committee for supporting Ready to Run® and NEW Leadership® virtual workshops serving thousands of participants across the country. We’re hopeful that a successful vaccine distribution will mean a return to in-person events and an opportunity to once again raise a glass and share a story with our friends and supporters.