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January 03, 2019 12:11 PM UTC

Colorado Legislature Close to Gender Equality

  • 19 Comments
  • by: DENependent

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

The new legislative session will open with 45% of Colorado General Assembly seats being held by women according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers. This is second only to Nevada where 50.8% of the seats are held by women (well done Nevada).

Unsurprisingly most of these women are Democrats. In the state senate 11 of the 12 women are Democrats and in the house 25 of the 33 women are Democrats. Another way to look at it is that more than half of the Democratic caucus (60.97% of the house and 57.89% of the senate) in Colorado are women.

All of these numbers are increases from 2018 when 38.0% of Colorado legislators were women and our state ranked down in 4th place.

FiveThirtyEight had an excellent analysis of Why the Republican Party Elects So Few Women last year. Their answer was that Republicans first do not get as many women to run for office as Republicans and then the retention of women in office is worse on the Republican side.

The top 10 states:
Nevada (50.8%) (up from #3)
Colorado (45.0%) (up from #4)
Oregon (41.1%) (up from #9)
Washington (40.8%) (up from #5)
Vermont (39.4%) (unchanged % drops them from #2)
Maine (38.7%) (up from #7)
Alaska (38.3%) (new to the top 10, was #12)
Rhode Island (38.1%) (up from #10)
Arizona (37.8%) (down from #1)
Maryland (37.2%) (increased %, but down from #8)

Also unsurprisingly given the gap between the parties is that very red West Virginia and Mississippi are nearly tied for last place with 14.2% and 14.4% respectively.

Comments

19 thoughts on “Colorado Legislature Close to Gender Equality

  1. Personally I hope that the average number of women serving in our legislature from 2019-2028 will be around 50%. It is a healthy sign when a representative body is close to the makeup of the people it represents.

    1. 45 percent is not to be sneezed at.   When I started covering the lege in 1972 you could count the women on your fingers with both thumbs left over.

        1. Well, there is the trickle down opening for the Republicans to appoint a woman to the House, now that a male state Rep. is slated to fill Sen. Baumgartner's seat.  That could push Colorado to 46.3% or so.

          I'm sure that will be a substantial consideration for the Republican vacancy committee … /s.

    1. Damn it Dave. You made me strain a muscle when I rolled my eyes at you.

      I know you're an odious troll, but here is my serious answer:

      Yeah, humans are more complicated than just two genders. Just like race can be more complicated than just black, white, Asian, and Hispanic.

      One of our legislators being seated, Brianna Titone, is a transgender woman. She still gets counted in the woman column because that is how she identifies herself. No one who identified as something other than a man or woman has won a seat. So yeah, it is binary for now. I expect this will change before the next decade is out since non-binary people are increasing in acceptance and coming out just the same way that gays did years ago.

      Also, Rep. Titone, I am sorry I doubted your ability to take that seat away from the Republicans. I thought there would be too much prejudice in a relatively suburban district. I am glad to say that I was wrong.

      1. Especially being the Faith Bible Chapel district.  Your skepticism was understandable.  I'm willing to bet Rep. Titone understands that feeling.

              1. Speaking of odious trolls. I'm thrilled for Rep. Titone. I watched her campaign from the time she declared, and she did everything right. I'm hoping for a few more like her coming up.

              2. Yep….I live in the district…and while it is nice that Brianna took the seat most recently held by Sias (who was bad, but not a fucking nightmare), it is even more satisfying that she holds the seat formerly held by RWNJ Szabo….who was, in fact, a fucking nighmare. 

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