Data Point: All-Women Senate Delegations

If, as expected, Minnesota’s Governor Mark Dayton names a woman to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Senator Al Franken, Minnesota will become the fourth state currently and the sixth state ever to have an all-female Senate delegation, according to the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP), a unit of the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers University-New Brunswick.

California (the first state to be represented by two women in the Senate), New Hampshire, and Washington all have two women currently serving in the Senate. Kansas and  Maine had all-female delegations in the past.

New Hampshire’s congressional delegation is currently all women, including the two senators and two women who hold the state’s seats in the House of Representatives. From 2013-2015, all of the Granite State’s top posts were held by women, with the first all-female congressional delegation along with a woman governor. Washington had a woman governor and two women senators from 2005-2013.

See the full release with details here.

The Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP), a unit of the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is nationally recognized as the leading source of scholarly research and current data about American women’s political participation. Its mission is to promote greater knowledge and understanding about women’s participation in politics and government and to enhance women’s influence and leadership in public life. CAWP’s education and outreach programs translate research findings into action, addressing women’s under-representation in political leadership with effective, imaginative programs serving a variety of audiences. As the world has watched Americans considering female candidates for the nation’s highest offices, CAWP’s over four decades of analyzing and interpreting women’s participation in American politics have provided a foundation and context for the discussion.