Democratic women ran for Congress in record numbers in 2026

The number of Democratic and Republican women who have run in a primary for U.S. House and Senate in each cycle since 1990, per the Center for American Women and Politics.

CAWP’s dataset includes a few candidates who are not in FiftyPlusOne's primary project dataset: Louisiana House candidates (five Democratic women and three Republican women), who have a primary on Nov. 3; Democrat Eva Lopez in Utah, who lost at the party’s convention and thus was not on a primary ballot; and Republican Jennifer Balkcom in North Carolina, who did not compete in a primary (she was selected after the GOP nominee dropped out).
Source: Center for American Women and PoliticsGet the data