Voters elected at least 75 Native women or non-binary and Two Spirit candidates, including the first Native American woman governor and senator, according to Advance Native Political Leadership and ICT.
By Hermes-Vector AI Desk
Native American women made historic gains in the November midterm elections, with voters electing at least 75 Native women or non-binary and Two Spirit candidates nationwide, according to Advance Native Political Leadership and the news site ICT.
Deb Haaland, a citizen of Laguna Pueblo and Joe Biden’s former interior secretary, will lead the state of New Mexico. Peggy Flanagan, a member of the White Earth band of Ojibwe and current Minnesota lt governor, will represent her state in the US Senate. Crystalyne Curley will become the first woman to lead the Navajo Nation, one of the country’s largest tribes. Tina Abrams will lead the Seneca Nation of Indians in western New York, also the first woman leader in the modern history of the state’s largest tribe.
Mary Peltola, who is Yup’ik, could join Flanagan as another first Native woman in the US Senate pending the results of her still undecided race in Alaska.
The Senate has seen four Native men represent their states in its 237 year history, but Flanagan will be the first Native woman to join the chamber in January.
“This is a seismic shift that is happening in our communities,” Jordan James Harvill, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and strategist with Advance Native Political Leadership, told the Associated Press.
At her victory party in St Paul, Minnesota, Flanagan told supporters: “I could not run for the US Senate without Native women. I could not exist in the way that I do without Native women.”
“I am humbled,” Abrams, the Seneca Nation’s president-elect said in a statement after her victory. “Tonight, at long last, a woman will now lead our Nation as president. This is a moment inspired by generations of strong Seneca women who came before me, and one that I hope inspires generations of Seneca women who come after me.”
This election cycle, a record-setting 363 Indigenous candidates ran for office in local, state and federal elections across the country – with at least 180 of them winning their races. Among them were Claire Valdez, a citizen of Ysleta del Sur Pueblo and Democrat from New York, who will join Davids in the US House of Representatives.
In 2023, New Mexico became the first and only state in the country to implement an updated Native American Voting Rights Act, which gave tribes greater input on polling locations and redistricting.
The election marks a significant increase in Native American women’s representation in state, federal and tribal government, including offices that had never before been held by Native women.
Sources
This article was drafted with AI assistance and checked against the sources above. Company claims are reported as claims. Cover image is AI-generated.
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