Time With...Congresswoman Elise Stefanik

Congresswoman Elise Stefanik has a plan to get more Republican women elected

- Alana Abramson

REPRESENTATIVE ELISE STEFANIK CAN PINPOINT the moment that crystallized the issue for her: It was the week after the midterm elections, and the newly elected members of the House of Representatives lined up for a photo. Representing the Democratic side of the aisle were more than 30 women. On the GOP side were two—Carol Miller of West Virginia and Young Kim of California.

Stefanik knew what could have been. “I recruited over 100 women,” she says, reflecting on her time as recruitment chair for the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC). But looking at the freshmen on the Capitol steps, she saw whom her party was welcoming in 2019: almost all white men. And within days, mail-in ballots showed that Kim had actually lost, bringing the grand total for House GOP freshmen women to one.

“That was a stark, stark wake-up call,” Stefanik says. She stood up at a meeting with her fellow House Republicans shortly after the election. “ ‘Take a look around,’” she recalls telling them in the basement of the Capitol. “ ‘This is not reflective of the American public. And you need to do something about it.’”

She wasn’t willing to wait. As we sit in her office on Capitol Hill, the topic is E-PAC, the political action committee she officially relaunched in January to focus solely on recruiting women and helping them win. Her initial aim was to raise $100,000; as of April 1, according to a spokesperson, she had raised over $285,000. Her office declined to provide a set number of women she intends to recruit beyond expressing a desire to exceed last cycle’s 100.