When women enter into politics, they can find themselves butting up against a whole slew of obstacles that, for most of the history of the US government, no one even realized were there. These obstacles come from a system that was designed to be universal, but turns out was actually designed for men, though people might not have recognized the difference until women began participating in that system, a thing that’s now happening in record numbers.
One such major obstacle women face when getting into politics (and any number of other industries) is how to navigate childcare duties while also launching a political campaign. For a couple hundred years, this was not something male politicians had to think about. (And the few women in politics were seen as outliers and exceptions who were left to figure it out on their own.)
The expectation was that childcare was something left to their wife at home. Even if that wife also worked, childcare was her responsibility to figure out and to make sacrifices for. Not only did men not have to factor the time and energy of childcare into their political campaign and careers, but they didn’t need to think about the financial burden either.
So now that more and more women–many of them mothers–are entering politics, there’s nothing built into the existing structures to facilitate their needs. In fact, there are some rules that specifically work against them. Like the inability to use campaign money for childcare.
Last May, Liuba Grechen Shirley petitioned the Federal Election Commission for permission to use campaign funds to pay for childcare. At the time, she said, “Our babysitter is just as important as my campaign manager or my finance director. She’s just as integral, and she’s paid as staff. I couldn’t run my campaign without her.”
This isn’t just limited to politics, of course. In her fantastic and infuriating book Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, Caroline Criado Perez writes about the inherent gender bias in the workplace, and how that bias doesn’t just pop up at work, “it is woven into the laws that govern how employment works. For example,” she writes, “what counts as a workplace expense.”
Criado Perez says, “In the US, what is an allowable work expense is decided by the IRS, which explains that ‘Generally you cannot deduct personal, living, or family expenses.’ But what counts as a personal expense is debatable.” She tells the story of Dawn Bovasso, one of the few female creative directors in US advertising, who also happens to be a single mother.
“So when her firm announced that it was hosting a directors’ dinner, Bossavo has a decision to make,” writes Criado Perez.” Was this dinner worth the $200 it would cost her for a sitter and travel? Bossavo’s male colleagues on the whole had to do no such mental accounting … In Bossavo’s case, her male colleagues were able just to check their calendar and accept or decline. And most of them accepted. In fact not only did they accept, they also booked the hotel next to the restaurant, so they could drink. And unlike her sitter, this cost was claimable on company expenses.”
Bossavo sums it up: “You can get $30 for takeout if you work late (because your wife isn’t there to cook you dinner) or $30 for Scotch if you want to drink your face off, but you can’t get $30 for a sitter (because your wife is home with the kids).” In the event, Bossavo was able to get her company to cover the cost of her childcare – but as she points out, “these have been exceptions I’ve had to ask for.” Which is women all over: always the exception, never the default.
Like Bossavo, Liuba Grechen Shirley had her request approved by the FEC. And that decision set a precedent for other women and primary caretakers to be able to use campaign funds for childcare. But also like Bossavo, she and others in her situation are still exceptions to the rule. Every state has its own campaign finance law, and in the year since Grechen Shirley’s request was granted, a number of states have denied women the ability to use their campaign funds for the “personal” cost of childcare.
An article published this week on HuffPost writes of the challenges women have faced when petitioning their local (almost always male) officials.
When Catie Robinson, a candidate for county commissioner in Texas, first raised the issue, her opponent said it would be akin to letting him use campaign funds to kennel a dog. In July, Iowa’s elections ethics board announced it couldn’t determine whether child care was a campaign expense or a personal one and that the legislature should decide. The Republican-led Iowa house rejected a proposal to permit child care expenditures this March.
In Louisiana, a member of the election ethics board implied that a female petitioner was putting political ambitions before her children and called the use of campaign funds for child care a “misplaced priority.”
And earlier this month, Connecticut’s all-male state election commission ruled against Caitlin Clarkson Pereira, who ran for a state House seat in 2018. Connecticut legislators are considering a bill to allow campaign funds to pay for child care while Pereira weighs a potential court challenge.
Other states have been better, either on an individual level or–as with California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Utah–in proposing legislation to change the laws regarding campaign funds and childcare. But for now, these successes are exceptions, not the rule.
Grechen Shirley lost her race last November, but she now heads up a PAC called Vote Mama, which offers mentorship, endorsement, and funding to mothers running for office. “If we want a government reflective of our society, we need to break down barriers for women, for mothers, for people of color seeking elected office,” she told HuffPost. If more women, and specifically more mothers served in public office, she says, “We wouldn’t be the only [developed] country in the world that doesn’t guarantee paid maternity leave. We wouldn’t have representatives voting to take away health care protections for maternity coverage. We need people at the table who live those issues every day.”
(image: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)
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