EMILYs List Celebrates National Coming Out Day

For Immediate Release
October 11, 2021

EMILYs List Celebrates National Coming Out Day

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Laphonza Butler, president of EMILYs List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, released the following statement celebrating National Coming Out Day:
  
“Representation matters. That’s why EMILYs List is honored to celebrate National Coming Out Day with the LGBTQ+ community. I’m proud of the work EMILYs List has done to help elect LGBTQ+ candidates at every level of government, including groundbreakers like Assemblywoman Cecelia González (NV-AD16) who became the first openly LGBTQ+ Asian American in the Nevada Legislature; state Rep. Vernetta Alston (NC-HD29), the first openly LGBTQ+ woman of color elected to the North Carolina House; state Sen. Tiara Mack (RI-SD06), the first openly LGBTQ+ Black person elected to the Rhode Island Senate; and Rep. Angie Craig (MN-02), who is the first lesbian mother to serve in Congress. Today and every day, we remain committed to electing even more Democratic pro-choice LGBTQ+ women to office and offer gratitude to everyone who works for equality.”

EMILYs List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, has raised over $700 million to elect Democratic pro-choice women candidates. With a grassroots community of over five million members, EMILY's List helps Democratic women win competitive campaigns – across the country and up and down the ballot – by recruiting and training candidates, supporting and helping build strong campaigns, researching the issues that impact women and families, running nearly $50 million in independent expenditures in the last cycle alone, and turning out women voters and voters of color to the polls. Since our founding in 1985, we have helped elect the country's first woman as vice president, 158 women to the House, 26 to the Senate, 16 governors, and more than 1,300 women to state and local office. More than 40 percent of the candidates EMILYs List has helped elect to Congress have been women of color. After the 2016 election, more than 60,000 women reached out to EMILY's List about running for office laying the groundwork for the next decade of candidates for local, state, and national offices. In our effort to elect more women in offices across the country, we have created our Run to Win program, expanded our training program, including a Training Center online, and trained thousands of women.