Women hold a slight majority of seats in the Legislature after this year’s elections, though men still hold a majority in the Senate.
In the state House, women comprise 44 House seats to 33 held by men, while men hold 26 of the 42 seats in the Senate.
Angelica Rubio, New Mexico director of Vote, Run, Lead, a nonprofit that trains women to run for office, said having more women in elected positions in the legislature has helped to change the culture but challenges remain for women to run.
Rubio, a Democrat who represents a portion of Las Cruces, said that prior to becoming a state representative herself in 2016, she worked in the legislature as a member of the staff. She said that a few decades ago, when the legislature was dominated by men, the culture there felt very “bro-y.”
But, she said, with women having gained the majority of the state House a few years ago and with more women in the legislature, there is more of a culture of collaboration. Rubio said that with the national shift to the right that occurred on Nov. 5, there are some in the legislature who have already begun to reach out to each other to talk strategy. Rubio, who was first elected in 2016, the same year as President-elect Donald Trump’s first term, said the Nov. 5 results were “soul-crushing.”
“But it’s also part of the work. This progress takes time. When it comes to policy, it’s incremental and even though a lot of us operate from a sense of urgency, we have to reconcile the two,” she said.
Rubio said that since Vote, Run, Lead got its start in 2014, 55,000 women around the country have run for political office, from local school boards to higher offices. She said that Trump’s election in 2016, appeared to spark “a tremendous amount of women,” seeking training to run for political office.
Rubio said one barrier to women running for legislative seats in New Mexico is the fact that it is not professionalized. She said that every year she struggles with the question of whether she can afford to serve as a legislator. She said that, in terms of recruiting more women, asking them to run for the legislature and work year-round without a salary is “a huge sacrifice.”
She said that since women are often the primary caregivers with children, having to navigate the work involved in being an unpaid legislator for a woman who has children can be particularly daunting. She said that, often, women take on many different roles within their communities and asking them to volunteer to be a state lawmaker on top of other responsibilities can also be a barrier.
Rubio said another barrier is that women are often taught to be “in the background and help others be successful.” She said that it can be hard to “feel confident in these spaces.”
But, with a possibly unified conservative party in charge at the national level, Rubio said this is a time when “it’s even more of a reason [for women] to run,” since the Republican party won with an “anti-woman, anti-LGBTQ and anti-trans” agenda. She said even more women may respond to the new political landscape by trying to run at the state level in the near future.
“It’s going to potentially revive that splurge of women, just feeling like it’s important for them to step up and run,” Rubio said.
