Hillary Scholten

A dedicated fighter for justice and equality

Rep. Hillary Scholten ran for Michigan’s newly-redrawn 3rd Congressional District to expand opportunity for all West Michiganders. Growing up, Scholten was inspired by her parents–an special education teacher and local sports reporter– to give back to her community, and to stand up and do something about injustices she saw around her. An invested member of her church and her community, she has lived her values by dedicating her career to service. Scholten earned a degree in social work and became a case worker for members of the LGBTQ+ community who faced housing discrimination. She then went to law school and clerked for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit before working for the Department of Justice under President Obama. In 2017, appalled by the unjust policies of the new administration, she returned home to Michigan and joined the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center as an attorney, and volunteered with the Times Up Legal Defense Fund, offering her legal expertise to those whom the system has left behind and ignored. Scholten and her husband live in Grand Rapids, Michigan with their two young sons, in the same neighborhood where her grandparents grew up.

A champion for Michigan’s working families

“I am running because I know I have the experience, the perspective and the vision needed to lead West Michigan forward together,” Scholten has said. She is committed to expanding economic opportunity for western Michigan working families. As an attorney who focuses on immigration law, Scholten understands what’s at stake in the fight to get our government working for the people. She has seen how the COVID-19 pandemic has intensified problems Michigan families were already facing, including lack of access to quality, affordable health care. As a mother of two school-age kids, she knows firsthand the challenges students and families have faced, and she has the experience and the courage to champion policy solutions to inequities in education and opportunity. Having witnessed an “unprecedented attack on our electoral system, the very bedrock of our democracy,” she has said, Scholten ran to defend our democracy and to fight for our most fundamental rights. “We need a leader who is prepared to go to Washington and bring solutions to the table,” she has said.

A victory that flipped a battleground state seat

Scholten ran for Michigan’s newly redrawn 3rd Congressional District, challenging incumbent Republican Rep. Peter Meijer, whose failed leadership has hurt the people he was elected to serve. EMILY’s List was with Scholten every step of the way in her 2020 House campaign as she mounted a formidable grassroots campaign to bring about change in this traditionally Republican territory of this perennial swing state, and with newly redrawn lines that made this race a tossup, we helped her flip this seat.  Scholten has the courage, work ethic, and commitment to her community that it will take to advocate for them in Congress. We showed Scholten the full support of the EMILY’s List community and helped elect this champion for West Michigan families.