The 2016 election of President Donald Trump had a consequence that may have not been anticipated — a surge in the number of women running for elective office.
One of them was Julie Flowers.
Flowers, a 39-year-old Beverly minister, had often thought of running for office, but never pulled papers.
Though she wasn’t confident she could win, she said she felt compelled to run after seeing Trump defeat Hillary Clinton that November.
It dismayed her that an “unpolished, inexperienced” man was able to top “a woman who was really experienced,” said Flowers, now a first-term councilor.
“Maybe what we need to do as women is get more involved,” she said, thinking back to the days following the presidential election. “If I think that, I thought, maybe I should be willing to do it.”
It is not an uncommon perspective. Though women are often more cautious about throwing themselves into politics, when they decide to run it’s often because they don’t like the decisions being made around them.
Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, 51, said she loved the city but thought it could be more than what it was. She won her first term as mayor in 2005, besting an incumbent in the preliminary election and a longtime councilor in the final.
“It feels like it’s still coming from a place of frustration or anger,” Driscoll said of how women find motivation, adding that perhaps they come to a breaking point of “I can’t stand it anymore” when they watch policies that affect them being created completely by men.
‘A seat at the table’
The idea of representing a group that’s underrepresented in government is a common thread for many women who have run on the North Shore.
Lisa Peterson, 39, who was elected to the City Council in Salem last fall, was driven by the desire to see more women represented. Lucy Corchado, 50, a former Salem councilor, wanted to serve an underprivileged neighborhood. And Esther Ngotho, a council candidate in Beverly last fall, wanted more minority representation.
Peterson said she had never envisioned herself running for office, but was “immediately struck by” the idea that for the country to progress, “more competent, smarter, strong leaders” from the local to national levels need to be voted in. When she thought about who those new leaders would be, she said, she “didn’t have a good excuse not to jump in myself.”
She chose to take on a well-known incumbent, Steve Lovely, for the Ward 3 seat.
“I thought it was a big challenge, but I never thought it was impossible,” Peterson said.
As for challenging an incumbent, she said she thinks sometimes women “wait their turn” — wait for an open seat rather than challenge someone.
“And if we do that, the true reality is that we’re never going to reach gender parity in our lifetime,” she said.
Both Flowers and Peterson participated in a program run by Emerge Massachusetts, an organization that helps Democratic women get elected, to learn about fundraising and how to run a successful campaign. It helped to “demystify” the campaign process, Peterson said, from door-knocking to making phone calls to simply running “a sophisticated campaign.” Taking on an incumbent felt “less intimidating” afterward.
Following the 2016 presidential election, double the number of women applied to Emerge programs. Thirty-two women participated in programs during the 2016 election year; last year, there were 66. The organization also held “Women Organizing to Win” workshops, attended by 141 women.
Increased participation by women is also happening on a…
