Women of Color Were Shut Out of Congress For Decades. Now They’re Transforming It.

The 2020 election might have been a battle between two white male septuagenarians, but it also contained two major political milestones for women of color. The first is that on Wednesday, Sen. Kamala Harris will be sworn in as the first Black and South Asian American vice president — the first woman and first woman of color to serve in that role.

Kamala Harris

The second is that a historic number of women of color — 49 in total, according to data collected by the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University1class=”footnote”> — will serve in the 117th Congress, including the first three Korean American women elected to Congress and the first Black women to represent Washington state and Missouri.

As the chart below shows, the 117th Congress marks a big step forward:

More women of color are serving in Congress than ever before

Each segment represents a woman’s tenu