Report Card for  NJ Women Officeholders: 

Most Counties Need Improvement

Most New Jersey counties continue to draw poor to mediocre grades for their efforts to elect women as freeholders and mayors, but do somewhat better in electing women to local councils. Mercer County sits at the head of the class overall, while Warren County seems to need remedial work.

These are the findings of the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP), a unit of the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. CAWP compiled 2017 data on both numbers and percentages of women freeholders, mayors and council members in New Jersey’s 21 counties.

The full release, including detailed tables, is 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.