Michelle Quist: Year of the Woman in Utah politics, with more to come

Author: Michelle Quist / Source: The Salt Lake Tribune

As forecast, 2018 was the Year of the Woman. Women across the country were elected at a historic rate. At the national level, Jennifer Rubin summarized: “Women will hold at least 96 seats in the House, a record; at least 23 members of the U.S. Senate and nine governors will be women. Overall, at least 117 women have been elected as House members, senators or governors.”

Even here in Utah, while we lost our only female member of Utah’s federal delegation when Mia Love lost to Ben McAdams, we still made strides toward a more equal, and more representative, government.

In fact, the 2019 Legislature will see a record-number of women – 25 women will serve, 19 in the House and six in the Senate. That accounts for 24 percent of the total Legislature, which is still below the national average of 28 percent. The record goes back to 2002, when 24 women served in the Utah Legislature. So at least we’re heading in the right direction again.

Of course, most of those women were elected by Democrats — but I keep bringing that up and people keep shoo-shooing me, so it must not mean anything.

There are seven newly elected female legislators this year — six are in the House, five are Democrats and five flipped a seat from a man to a woman. Three of those…

Click here to read more