Wilmington, Del. — In case you missed it, Lisa Blunt Rochester joined Maryland Senate candidate Angela Alsobrooks for a candid conversation with ELLE magazine about their shared experiences as Black women running for the Senate, what it means for two Black women to serve in the Senate together for the first time, and their optimism for the future.
Read the full article here.
On the importance of having a “sister-senator” to lean on:
- “[Running for office] is a very isolating thing. Even though we’ve got all these people around us, and you’re going to all these events, it is a very solitary endeavor. That’s why you can say sister senator soon-to-be, because we know we’re experiencing some of the same challenges, whether it is self-funders, whether it is people’s perceptions, whether it’s microaggressions. I remember having experiences with two [male] senators and having to point out to them, “Did you notice how those guys didn’t talk to me, only to you?” Even the challenges of trying to raise money when Black women get maybe a third of what our white counterparts get when we call the same person. These are things that we share.”
On joining forces with Angela Alsobrooks in the Senate:
- “Hopefully, I am going to have a built-in ally [in the Senate], and we’re going to be able to do some really big and bold work. You think of something like maternal mortality, where Black women die three times the rate of our white counterparts. Hopefully, we will be in the Senate and can work on it. Then we can partner with [other Black women] like Representatives Lauren Underwood and Robin Kelly in the House. That representation in all of these places is important, because one branch can’t do it alone. The history-making part is good, but the impact is what we’re all going for, to make a difference in people’s lives. The ability to go to the Senate and be one of 100—but also as two of only five [Black women senators] in the history of this country—would be incredible.”
On sharing her family’s legacy on the campaign trail:
- “I look at it as my roots and my wings. There was a document that my sister found that allowed our great-great-great-grandfather, who had been enslaved in Georgia, to have the right to vote. He signed an “X” on that document, because he couldn’t read or write, and we turned [that document] into a scarf that I carry with me. It was with me on the day I was sworn in that very first time. It was with me on January 6. I carry that, because it’s not only about my roots, but it’s representative of the roots of this country, and the things that we have made it through, whether it is slavery or Jim Crow or Reconstruction or two World Wars or 9/11 or the pandemic or George Floyd’s murder.
“Then I also look at my wings. Us being in these positions allows our wings—the future — to see what is possible. I think of my children, I think especially of my granddaughter. That’s why this moment with Kamala Harris is so special to me, because my granddaughter not only will be able to see what the vice president has done, but will benefit from [her policies]. It is about our roots, but it’s also about our wings and the future that’s coming.”