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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again everyone. With me now, Stephanie Schriock the long-time head of EMILY's List, the very influential political organization that has worked to get pro-choice women elected to political office. Schriock is stepping down after 10 years leading the group, which says it has raised nearly $500 million and help elect 1,000 women.

Now Stephanie Schriock has written a book called Run to Win: Lessons in Leadership for Women Changing the World. The forward is by no less than Kamala Harris. We'll talk about her election, but also Republican women making the biggest gains in Congress in the 2020 election and much more. Miss Schriock, thanks so much for joining us. Welcome to WNYC.

Stephanie Schriock: Well, thank you so much, Brian, for having me, thrilled to be here today.

Brian: Can you start with a bit of the origin story? If all people know that EMILY's List is that it helps select pro-choice women, where and how did it come into being?

Stephanie: Our founder, Ellen Malcolm, who actually think you've had on the show a few years, back in 1985, brought her girlfriends together because at that point, no democratic woman had won a seat in the US Senate in her own right, they got fed up and decided to change the world. They started EMILY's List, which is not named after a person, but is actually an acronym that stands for Early Money Is Like Yeast, meaning you got to get that early money before anybody takes you seriously.

For women, that was the key. They started with initial early funding and it is now turned into the largest organization for women in politics in this country providing coaching, recruitment, training, financial resources, independent expenditures, you name it. We're solely committed to electing democratic pro-choice women and that's the work that we've now been doing for 35 years.

Brian: I think you answered a question just now that millions of people have probably asked themselves for about a second-and-a-half, who was this EMILY? Now we know there was no EMILY.

Stephanie: We are all EMILY, Brian, that's the truth. We really do think of it that way because we are all trying to make change, and make this a democracy of ours more representative of our communities.

Brian: Did you ever consider supporting pro-choice Republican women?

Stephanie: We have not. In those 35 years, in the beginning, to be honest, now I was not there 35 years ago, but when they got started, the first push was to convince the Democratic establishment that women could run and win. To do that, they needed a push from inside. That was the first decision point.

Then frankly as time went on, it became more and more clear that it's the Democratic Party that is much more open to providing opportunities for leadership and growth for women. We need more of it, but that there's a true commitment to equality for women and particularly women of color in the Democratic Party. The Republican Party does not share those same values including the very key personal value of being able to make the decision on your reproductive freedom.

Brian: Do you view the 2020 election, then, as a mixed bag? Obviously, Biden, Harris were elected and the Democrats took the Senate, but they also lost 12 seats in the House, and nine of them were flipped by Republican women. How do you see the results in partisan terms and in gender terms?

Stephanie: We knew that we had picked up so many congressional districts in 2018 that were going to be challenging to hold because we picked up a lot of districts that were districts that had voted for Trump in 2016. We went into the election, recognizing that we had incumbents that were going to have tough goes with Trump back on the ballot which is precisely what happened at the end of the day.

That being said, we do believe that there should be more women at the table. We work very, very hard on the Democratic side. I know I'm not necessarily supposed to be a champion of Republican women, but I'll tell you I think it's better to have more and more women. I'm really curious to be honest, if this is going to be a one-election change, or if this is an actual change in the Republican Party and their support for women on the ballot. The truth is those women for the most part because we have to do it all the time through EMILY's List, you got to win primaries before you get a chance to win a general election.

These Republican women won primaries. They won primaries in a very conservative way and they're very, very extreme, and part of it is because, in the Republican Party where we've been watching for decades, it's hard for women to get through those primaries. Finally, in 2020 we saw a bit of a change there. Let's see if that holds or not.

Brian: In fact, the most iconic pro-Trump person in Congress right now is a woman, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Does that surprise you?

Stephanie: I don't know if it surprises me or not. What I've seen is that in these primaries, particularly on the Republican side, let me just stepped back, for decades, women in both parties were more progressive in their voting than their male counterparts. Now I'm not suggesting Republican women were more progressive than Democratic men. That's not the case, but they did vote more progressively than their male Republican counterparts.

That has changed, and it changed with the rise of the Tea Party in 2010. Now, they, in essence, vote the same because there's a no-compromise attitude in the Republican Party, which I think is a very dangerous situation to be in. For these women who, initially, are seen as folks who are willing to sit down and compromise, now to get through primaries, they've got to be so far to the right to convince everybody that they are not moderate, that we end up with these extremist women on the Republican side. I worry that that is the direction we're going. I don't think that's good.

The era of the Olympia Snowes and Nancy Kassebaums, and those great Republican women that probably folks have forgotten about now who were in the '80s, '90s in the arts, those women, I don't think they make it through primaries anymore. That's the problem.

Brian: Susan Collins is, even though Democrats go "Argh," now when you mention Susan Collins for various reasons. My guest is Stephanie Schriock, the long-time head of Emily's List, the very influential political organization that has worked to get pro-choice Democratic women elected to political office. She's stepping down after 10 years leading the group and has a book called Run to Win: Lessons in Leadership for Women Changing the World. We'll get to some of the particular lessons as we go, but listeners, we're also opening up the phones for your questions for Stephanie Schriock, 646-435-7280, 646-435-7280, or you can tweet a question @BrianLehrer.

On the forward to your book, Vice President Harris writes with respect to Trump's big lie about the election being rigged that we are witnessing officials in certain States use this unprecedented crisis as a further excuse to suppress the right to vote. I'm curious if you being in the position that you've been in have started watching that Republican backlash to Trump's loss in certain states that may now actually make it harder to vote by mail in the future. Or what kinds of voter suppression laws or tactics do you think will be most in play before the next election?

Stephanie: I'm very concerned about this. This is one of the reasons over the last six years EMILY's List has expanded our work at the legislative level. For a long time, we thought of our legislative work as a pipeline, getting women into a pipeline so we had more and more women running for office at higher levels. Now we think of it as mission-critical because of the volume of legislation. I would argue bad legislation that is moving through, particularly Republican-controlled legislative chambers and voting rights are at the forefront of that. The Republican Party seems to be content to ignore our democracy and believe that the minority party should be in power. To maintain power when you are a growing minority party, you have to prevent people from voting. State by state, it's going to look different depending on who they're trying to prevent from voting.

Some of these continued changes will be obviously limits on vote by mail. There'll be limits on early vote period. You saw in Texas in 2020, the Republican governor in the middle of a pandemic, my goodness, say, "There's only going to be one drop box for early vote per county. When you got counties that are as big as Connecticut in Texas, that's outrageous, and then there's a [crosstalk]

Brian: They're against drop boxes altogether because you can't bet as easily who's coming and dropping, who knows what, but it's really the same as putting something in a mailbox where there isn't a guard standing and checking your ID at the mailbox so it's really no different than voting by mail.

Stephanie: That's right. That's exactly right. This current Republican party, this is not the Republican Party we grew up with, Brian. This is a different Republican Party. They know that their power only now survives by limiting people's access to voting. That is a very dangerous place to be and one that we have got to fight back with everything we've got, period.

Brian: Even beyond that, have you seen the scary trend of Republicans at the state level in some places that Trump tried to contest censuring or purging elected officials or party officials who stood up against the big lie? In Michigan, I see they replaced the Republican elections official who cashed the swing vote to certify that state's result. In Arizona, they voted to censure the Republican governor who certified the vote. Do you see this as a sign that if something like this false claim of an election being rigged happens again, the wall of professionalism is less likely to hold against the wall of party, over everything?

Stephanie: I think it's worse than party over everything. It is what an authoritarian regime does to gather control of any opposition. The first-place authoritarian regimes look are within themselves. We've been watching this really again, since the rise of the Tea Party in 2010, where there was zero acceptance of standing outside the line. You cannot cross the party.

That was even before Trump and that's why we saw fewer and fewer Republicans willing to cut deals. I think that's why you went through so many Republican speakers in the House who just said, "This is impossible to hold these caucuses together." There's a no-compromise attitude that leads toward authoritarianism. Democrats and independents and Americans who care about liberty and democracy have to be very, very aware of what this new Trumpian Republican Party is doing. It's dangerous. You're exactly right.

We are watching and monitoring this and really thinking through what we have to do to keep engaging women at the local levels to actively participate, not just in running for office, which we talk about in the book, but also just getting involved in the party structures or getting involved in local organizations because that's where a lot of this is going to happen and where nationally we're going to miss it because we're not going to be looking at the local levels.

Brian: On that point, I want to ask you one more question that's political analysis before we get to some of the advice in your book. In fact, people listening right now, if you have any question for Stephanie Schriock from EMILY's List, you can call in and in particular, if you are a woman who has run for office at the local level because that's so much of what this is aimed at.

Whether you've won or lost, what lessons have you learned that you think might apply to other candidates and help other candidates who are women in particular? What experiences do you want to share that might highlight the difference between running for the same office, even in the same primary, in the same party as a band with the same views, or anything else you want to raise or ask? 646-435-7280, 646-435-7280, or tweet your question @BrianLehrer.

The last political analysis question is that it seems like at the state level where your group and others that support Democrats have been the least successful. It didn't get any better in 2020. There has been a trend in the last 10 years or so to more Republican state legislatures, and this year, even though Democrats took the presidency and the US Senate, I think they did not flip one state legislature from majority red to majority blue, correct me if I'm wrong. Why such failure at the state level with so much at stake?

Stephanie: I'll talk about 2020 because I think a couple of things happen there. In '18 and actually in '16, we were able to make some gains and pick some chambers up. We're not in great shape, but we are in better shape than we were a decade ago with control of chambers. The other thing that has happened because of the work of a lot of great organizations and individuals is more and more states do their redistricting, which is what's coming up here now in the next year.

A lot of states are under commissions now instead of having the legislature drive that which is going to, I believe, lead to fair districts. That's what we really, in our opinion, need to be fighting for, fair districts, not gerrymandered districts on either side of the aisle. In 2020, you are right, we ran a lot, a lot of legislative candidates. We did not pick up the chambers we were hoping to. We held onto most of the chambers that we did pick up in '18, that was a positive sign but we wanted to make gains.

I thought about this a lot, and we're going to look at it more and more. The thing about legislative races is that so much of it is done door-to-door particularly in presidential cycles where all of the news, the culture, the advertising, the television, digital, and mail is getting driven by a presidential race with Senate races underneath it and you're overloaded.

If you're a legislative candidate, you got to break through that. The way that you're able to break through it is by hitting the doors, by going door-to-door in the neighborhoods, and talking to folks.

We had a pandemic, and our side felt that public health was much more important than going door-to-door. The Republicans did not take that tact because, frankly, some of them were ignoring the fact that there wasn't even a COVID crisis, which now is still raging in this country. In that vein, we miss some opportunities. It was awfully hard. We talked about it a lot at EMILY's List. We wanted to hit the doors, but that's a hard choice to make when there is a public health crisis.

I think we would have picked up more seats if we had been on the doors, but I'm not sure in a public health crisis that would have been the right call. We were between a rock and a hard place for sure, in this endeavor. I think that was challenging and talking to a lot of legislative candidates and some of them started doing doors, what we call to do doors, knocking on people's doors, introducing yourself, having those one-on-one conversations, the basics of politics.

They started doing it towards the end. We usually keep track of, "How many times have you hit that door?" We're militant on what legislative candidates do when it comes to making those door knocks and this was a really challenging cycle for that. I don't know what the right call was, ultimately, because what do you do in a public health crisis?

Brian: Sarah in Union Square, you are on WNYC with Stephanie Schriock. Hi Sarah.

Sarah: Oh boy. Stephanie, this is-

Stephanie: Hi, Sarah.

Sarah: Oh, hi, Stephanie. It seems to me, this is a religious issue. Don't we have separation of church and state?

Brian: You are talking about abortion rights, right?

Sarah: Right. Yes. Thank you. What are your thoughts on that? Why does the government have to control what a woman can do with her body? Yes, if the umbilical cord has been cut and the baby draws its first breath, yes, the baby is a separate individual, but before that, I believe the baby is not, that's just my take on it. What are your thoughts on this as far as being a religious issue? Should it be kept out of the government control?

Brian: Sarah, thank you. It's always been interesting to me, in fact, Stephanie, that Roe v. Wade was not decided on First Amendment religious liberty grounds, or that nobody seems to raise this issue with the Supreme Court when they're trying to defend Roe as a constitutional right, because of course, the right is very friendly toward religious liberty in general.

If you look at, for example, the religion I grew up in, Reform Judaism, the largest branch of Judaism in the United States, their position is pro-choice. Why wouldn't it be a question of religious liberty if groups that are that mainstream, you don't even have to go to minority rights so much, groups that are that mainstream and certainly, Christian denominations are too, to call it a religious liberty First Amendment issue as the caller asks?

Stephanie: It's a really good point, and it is, as you think about where the American people are. Over 7 out of 10 Americans, very much believe that this is a choice that should be made by women and stand by Roe V. Wade. It's not just a religious piece, it is clearly a majority supported situation in this country, and yet the minority through the courts and through these conservative legislatures, keep pushing their religion on this.

Sarah is right, the caller is right. Pro-choice is about making your own choices here. Why would you want the government involved in making the most personal choice, which is how you're going to control your life and your family. That to me is always been a confusing endeavor because we are supposed to have a division here between government and religion. We also are in the United States and we know there's a very strong movement on the right that does not feel the same way.

Brian: It's always been an interesting divide along those lines of among libertarians because the pure libertarian position is limited government and that's limited government in economics, which would be considered conservative, but it's also limited government in your personal choices, which has led many libertarians to be pro-choice. More recently libertarians to stay within the graces of the Republican Party, have been declaring themselves anti-abortion rights in more cases, but that's always been a divide or more recently is a divide among libertarians.

One of the chapters in your book, which is designed mostly to help people running for office, women running for office is called Ask Yourself the Right Questions, Be Honest About the Answers. What are some of the right questions?

Stephanie: We love this because this is really where you have to start, and frankly it's probably where we should all be starting as we start our career journeys, our political journeys, whatever it is. It's two different areas of questions. One is why do you want to do it? What is driving you? What is the passion that you've got in your belly that's going to take you through this process, and to really know where that's coming from? One, it's what you're going to need when you are doing your sixth hour of fundraising phone calls. You need to be driven by something, you better know what that passion is, and you want to do that at the beginning. That's one set of questions, the why you want to do it.

The second set of questions is really about, do you have what it takes? Meaning, do you have enough time? Do you have the commitment to do the work? Sometimes you have to ask some really hard questions, which is, can you balance this with the family? Economically, can you do this? Unfortunately, and this is a big frustration for us at EMILY's List is that this nation has built out a political system that demands typically huge amounts of time from our candidates and our elected officials.

When you look at particularly legislative races, there are some states where to run, it's going to take up half your time. If you've got a job, you've got two jobs now, you're going to be a candidate and you're going to do whatever your job is because you got to pay the rent and you got to make sure that you got food on the table and then you win. Some states don't even pay their legislators at all. They might get a per diem. Here in New York, they've got a much more professional operation going on for the state government, but if you're in Colorado or Montana [crosstalk]

Brian: Not everybody always thinks that but that's another show.

Stephanie: Fair enough. That being said, there's a balance here. If we want diversity of voices in our government, we got to make sure that we've got financial resources. I'm not trying to say people should be getting rich here, that's not the deal, but they should be able to do this work of service without going broke. I got to be honest, those questions are real. We've lost a lot of great women, particularly women of color, potential candidates because they personally can't financially figure out how to do it, meaning they can't pay the rent and get food on the table while they're running for office. That's awful.

Brian: Which is why a lot of progressive's support public funding of campaigns as a bulwark against inequality. Wesley in Sarasota, Florida, you are on WNYC with Stephanie Schriock from EMILY's List. Hi, Wesley?

Wesley: Hi, thank you all so much for having me in. Greetings from sunny Florida.

Brian: We are all jealous up here.

Stephanie: We are very jealous.

[laughter]

Wesley: I'll send a little up your way, but I actually ran for local office. I ran for county commission in 2018 and I was 25 when I did it at the time. I just want everyone listening, especially if you're younger and thinking about running for office to take the leap. You guys touched on some really important stuff how hard it is to keep food on the table and to pay bills. These are often even more insurmountable for my demographic. I just want to encourage everyone the amount of support, and I even got support from EMILY's List when I did it, it's there and it's real. I hope that more people in my cohort will take the leap.

I was wondering if you guys had any insights as the electoral map shifts and we see more millennial and Gen Z candidates. What can we expect from candidates like these? We see AOC, a lot of these big up-and-coming usually progressive-type candidates. What does the forecast look like for us electorally?

Stephanie: I am optimistic. I'm a Gen X-er, I'm in that older middle generation between the boomers and the millennial generation. I got to say, I am super excited about the energy and the differing views. One of the reasons, Christina Reynolds who's my co-author with Run to Win, and I wanted to write this book was because in 2017, as you were running and getting ready to run, what we were seeing is this younger, energetic generation coming into the process really for the first time. They were doing it their own way.

That was the other piece that we thought was really important. We have a chapter that says Break the Rules and Break Out of the Box. One of the reasons we wanted to talk about that is that for so long, society has told women who were running for office, "You basically just got to keep your head down, do it like a man, let's just face it. Wear the navy suits, have the short haircut?" You know what I mean? It's like, "Play the part so it looks like you fit in." All of a sudden it was like, "No, we are bringing our full, authentic selves."

I give it to our rising generations that are coming up and particularly the diversity of those two generations that are coming up. That will really change how this looks. I can't say I know exactly what that means, but you can already see it in their willingness to stand up and speak their truth, to be authentic, to talk about their own personal stories. For so long, women were told not really to share their stories about their families, their health care, their own vulnerabilities, but those are the powerful stories that connect you with voters and ultimately your constituents. I think that's what's going on and it's cool.

Brian: On bringing your full selves, and Wesley, thank you so much for your call-

Stephanie: Thank you for running.

Brian: -another of your chapters is called Campaign Joyfully, Show Gratitude Deliberately. On Campaign Joyfully, there's a lot of righteous anger in politics today. Historically, women who show anger are judged more negatively than men are. There are whole books written recently. We've had authors on the show who are writing about women's anger as a good thing. On Campaign Joyfully, are you advising against campaigning angry?

Stephanie: There's nothing wrong with a little righteous anger, I'll tell you that, but when you're mobilizing your volunteers, your network, those around you, we do think that there is so much power in being a joyful warrior. We talk about that a lot. We are in such a culture right now that there's so much anger. Particularly we see it on the right, where they're just driven by fear and anger.

What we're saying is, let's try this a different way. It doesn't mean that we're not angry about what's going on. Bringing in hope and joy in this process so it doesn't feel like a drudgery, but it is in fact, uplifting, we think really is a powerful place to be, and keeping everybody in, and gratitude. You do not do this alone, and I don't care what you're doing. You do not succeed in the workplace alone. You do not succeed as a candidate alone. You need each other. Showing that gratitude really, for starters just makes life better. It just does.

Brian: We're almost out of time. I'm going to sneak in one more call for you. This is a Dr. Linda in St. Albans, Queens, says she ran for office in 2016. Dr. Linda, thank you so much for calling in, and I apologize we've got 30 seconds for you. You're just about going to get the last word.

Dr. Linda: That's all I need Brian. Longtime listener. Thank you, Emily, for this book. I can't wait to read, Run to Win: Lessons. Where were you in 2016? We needed the coronation and support of the Democratic machine, but now we have you. I will be getting it today. [laughs]

Stephanie: Thank you. Thank you, and keep running. Keep running.

Brian: There you go. Thank you very much and call us again, we'll give you more time. How about that? Nice to end with a spontaneous blurb when you have a new book out, I'm sure. Yes, the book is called Run to Win: Lessons in Leadership for Women Changing the World, and the author is Stephanie Schriock, the 10-year head of EMILY's List, now stepping down. Thank you so much for joining us today.

Stephanie: Thank you for having me.

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