Meet Renée Johnson, the National Training Director for the United State of Women (USOW), whose goal is to get more women of color into politics.
Sounds like a formidable task, but Johnson seems to be up to it. USOW is an initiative started in 2016 by the White House Council on Women and Girls, and last June they held the first-ever “United State of Women Summit” with more than 5,000 experts, advocates, and business leaders. Still, even though women in general turned out in big numbers, the force of women of color was lacking.
Johnson, unfortunately, is used to being among the few women–and few Black women–in politics. When she started her career in government it was extremely male-dominated, to say the least. “I was 25 years old when I first joined a House office on Capitol Hill as a legislative aide,” she told Bossed Up. “I had already finished my BA and master’s degree, and was concurrently working on a third degree when I started this job. It wasn’t easy, and I honestly believe that because so many people of color have been told we need to be twice as prepared to get half as far, I pursued a ton of higher education — perhaps more than I needed.”
She wasn’t long into her career before Johnson realized there has a major void of Black women in government. “Soon after I started on the House side I was offered a position in the upper chamber (a Senate Office), and realized that I was the only woman of color in the office. I was constantly reminded of my minority status in a sea of faces that were not similar to my own in the capitol building…I worked diligently and always looked for opportunities to prove myself worthy, but I still felt like an outsider. It also broke my spirit when a senior staff member once told me I’d been hired especially because I was Black but ‘sounded white’ on the phone. They honestly believed they were giving me a compliment,” she revealed.
Now she wants to get more Black women in politics. “The USOW is a 501(c)3 nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that emerged from the White House Council on Women and Girls 2016 United State of Women to serve as a megaphone for the gender equality movement,” she explained.” We’re focused on giving the next generation of women in politics the tools needed to get more involved in civic life and championing the causes they care about.”
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