Primary Outlook: Women Candidates in Idaho

Kelly Dittmar

Gender Watch 2018From March to December 2018, the Barbara Lee Family Foundation (BLFF) and the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) partnered to offer Gender Watch 2018, which tracked, analyzed, and illuminated gender dynamics in the 2018 midterm elections. With the help of expert scholars and practitioners, Gender Watch 2018 furthered public understanding of how gender influences candidate strategy, voter engagement and expectations, media coverage, and electoral outcomes in campaigns. The blog below was written for Gender Watch 2018, as part of our collective effort to raise questions, suggest answers, and complicate popular discussions about gender’s role U.S. elections.

 

Ahead of the Idaho primary election on May 8, 2018, we outline the numbers and proportions of women who have filed as candidates for congressional and statewide office. The data below also provide points of historical comparison to give context to today’s presence and potential success of women candidates.

All data are provided from the Center for American Women and Politics, Eagleton Institute of Politics, Rutgers University. For a full list of the women candidates in Idaho primary races for congressional and statewide offices, see CAWP’s Election Watch page.

CONGRESS

Current: 0 of 4 members of the ID congressional delegation (0%)
Filed: 2 (1D, 1R)
Percent of all Filed Congressional Candidates (D/R): 15.4% (2 of 13)

SENATE

Current: 0 of 2 senators

  • No woman has ever represented Idaho in the U.S. Senate.

There is no U.S. Senate election in Idaho in 2018.

HOUSE

Current: 0 of 2 representatives (0%)

  • A total of 2 (1D, 1R) women have represented ID in the U.S. House, with the last woman – Helen Chenoweth (R) – leaving office in 2001.

Filed:  2 (1D, 1R)

  • Both women candidates for the U.S. House are competing for their party’s nomination to compete for the open House seat in Idaho’s 1st congressional district.

Districts with Women Candidates: 1 of 2
Percent of all Filed House Candidates (D/R):  15.4% (2 of 13)
Percent of all Filed Democratic House Candidates:  20% (1 of 5)
Percent of all Filed Republican House Candidates: 12.5% (1 of 8)

Recent history: The number of women who filed for major party candidacy for the U.S. House in Idaho in 2018 is not a record high. Between 2008 and 2018, the highest number of women candidates filed to run for the U.S. House was 4 in 2016, when there were no open U.S. House seats being contested. This year, there is 1 open House seat in Idaho – the only open House seat in the state in the past decade.

GOVERNOR

Current: 0
No woman has ever served as governor of Idaho.

Filed: 2 (1D, 1R)

  • Paulette Jordan (D) would be the first Native American woman governor in Idaho and nationwide.

Percent of all Filed Gubernatorial Candidates (D/R):  20% (2 of 10)
Percent of all Filed Democratic Gubernatorial Candidates:  33.3% (1 of 3)
Percent of all Filed Republican Gubernatorial Candidates: 14.3% (1 of 7)

Recent history: There have been a total of 4 (1D, 3R) women candidates for governor in the past 3 election cycles. No women ran for governor in 2014 and 2 (2R) ran in 2010.

OTHER STATEWIDE ELECTED EXECUTIVE OFFICES

Current: 1 (1R) of 7 positions (excludes governor) (14.3%)

  • Republican Sherri Ybarra is running for re-election as Idaho’s superintendent of public instruction.

Filed:  8 (3D, 5R)

  • 5 (1D, 4R) women are running for 2 open seat statewide executive contests for lieutenant governor and state treasurer.
  • 2 (2D) women are running to be challengers to Republican incumbents for secretary of state and superintendent of public instruction.

Percent of all Filed Statewide Executive (other than governor) Candidates (D/R): 40% (8 of 20)
Percent of all Filed Democratic Statewide Executive (other than governor) Candidates: 42.9% (3 of 7)
Percent of all Filed Republican Statewide Executive (other than governor) Candidates: 38.5% (5 of 13)

Recent history: The number of women who filed for major party candidacy for statewide elected executive offices (other than governor) in Idaho in 2018 is greater than the number who filed in 2014 (4: 3D, 1R) and 2010 (1R), when the same set of offices were last contested.

Kelly Dittmar headshot

Kelly Dittmar

Kelly Dittmar is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Rutgers–Camden and Director of Research and Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics at the Eagleton Institute of Politics. She is the co-author of A Seat at the Table: Congresswomen’s Perspectives on Why Their Representation Matters (Oxford University Press, 2018) (with Kira Sanbonmatsu and Susan J. Carroll) and author of Navigating Gendered Terrain: Stereotypes and Strategy in Political Campaigns (Temple University Press, 2015).

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