Elise Stefanik pushes to expand House GOP majority with record number of women

Rep. Elise Stefanik, the highest-ranking GOP woman in the House, is leading a charge to break the record for Republican women serving in the chamber, just six years after a blue wave wiped out their ranks.

Stefanik, R-N.Y., who chairs the GOP conference, has been focused on boosting the ranks of Republican women in the House ever since she sounded the alarm about the “crisis level” after the 2018 midterms, when the number of GOP women dwindled to just 13.

In the nearly six years since then, Stefanik and others have worked to recruit and provide early support to women candidates. The number of Republican women in the House has tripled to a record 36, including two nonvoting members.

This time, any gains could help the GOP grow from its current narrow majority, which has been plagued by disagreement and infighting, to a more robust governing majority next year.

"It’s a model that has worked effectively, and it’s going to be a model that works effectively this time," Stefanik said in an exclusive interview this week.

Others involved in the effort to boost GOP women are also hopeful they can reach a new milestone this year.

“We would love to see a new record set this cycle, but we aren’t taking anything for granted,” Winning for Women Action Fund Executive Director Danielle Barrow said in a statement. “Republicans owe the House majority to Republican women who have flipped battleground districts, and WFW Action Fund is working hard to defend and flip more of them in November.”

But breaking the record again could be a tall order, with some key departures on the horizon and other races hinging on how voters move in some of the most tightly divided districts in the country.

Three GOP women — Texas’ Kay Granger, Washington’s Cathy McMorris Rodgers and Arizona’s Debbie Lesko — are retiring, along with Puerto Rico’s resident commissioner, Jenniffer González-Colón, who is running for governor. Republicans are expected to gain at least two new women in the House, with North Dakota’s Julie Fedorchak and South Carolina’s Sheri Biggs winning primaries in deep-red open seats.

To break the current record, Republican female incumbents and challengers would have to win at least 11 of the 16 House races with female nominees that the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter rates as competitive, including some difficult re-election races and eight races with candidates running in Democratic districts.

“I still think we can get above where we are now,” Stefanik said, saying the female incumbents are strong candidates, pointing to Reps. Young Kim and Michelle Steel of California and Lori Chavez-DeRemer of Oregon.

“Those are tough races,” Stefanik said. “They are going to win those races.”

Stefanik also name-checked multiple women who could win competitive seats, including GOP former Reps. Yvette Herrell of New Mexico and Mayra Flores of Texas, and other candidates, including New York’s Alison Esposito and Alabama’s Caroleen Dobson.

Even if Republicans fall short of a new record, Stefanik said, the party is “moving in the right direction.”

Nearly six years ago, Stefanik declared that the number of GOP women in the House had reached a “crisis level.” She clashed with Tom Emmer of Minnesota, then the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, who said it would be a “mistake” for Stefanik to focus on supporting female candidates through her group, E-PAC. Stefanik responded at the time that she “wasn’t asking for permission.”

Since then, Stefanik said, Emmer and other GOP leaders have become partners in her effort, noting that leadership sometimes aligns with E-PAC on endorsements and that women were key to GOP gains in 2020.

A record number of female Republicans ran that year, a record broken again in 2022, when 261 GOP female candidates ran for the House, according to the Center for Women and Politics at the Rutgers Eagleton Institute of Politics. But this year the number has dropped to 161.

The number of House candidates has dropped overall since 2022, a redistricting year that brought a surge of new candidates. The Center for Women and Politics found the steepest drop was among Republican women. Asked about that decline, Stefanik pointed to fewer Republican retirements and fewer GOP targets this year, with Republicans in the majority.

For Stefanik, the effort to recruit more GOP women to run for the House has been a resounding success.

She said her push to support female candidates coincided with her own rise during President Donald Trump’s first impeachment hearings. The national profile helped her build a massive small-dollar fundraising list, which she has shared with candidates. This election cycle alone, Stefanik and her PAC have helped direct $2.5 million to Republican women.

Other groups have also engaged in the effort since that low point in 2018, including the Winning for Women Action Fund. Barrow said the group has raised more than $11 million for Republican women this election cycle. Stefanik pointed to outside groups like Winning for Women, VIEW PAC, RightNOW PAC and Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America as evidence of the growing effort.

Democratic women have been building their ranks in Congress for years.

While Republicans have 36 women in the House, Democrats have 94, including two nonvoting members. Democratic women have gotten sizable boosts over the years from EMILY’s List, which backs female candidates who support abortion rights.

Stefanik said she does not believe the GOP effort needs to be more centralized, noting that each group prioritizes different kinds of seats and different policies.

The groups have particularly focused on boosting women in primaries, which have long been obstacles for female Republican candidates.

While several women did win their primaries this year, there were some losses. In Alaska’s At-Large District, Stefanik and other leaders rallied behind Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom, who ended her campaign after Republican Nick Begich won more votes in the state’s all-party, top-four primary.

“We’re not going to have 100% success,” Stefanik said. “You have to take some risks to try to elevate the amazing backgrounds of these women, and everyone at the leadership table understood that.”

The decentralized effort has also run into some conflicts, most notably this year in Washington’s 3rd District, where Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is one of five Democrats defending seats Trump carried in 2020.

The Winning for Women Action Fund backed Camas City Council member Leslie Lewallen, who argued that the 2022 GOP nominee, Joe Kent, was unelectable. Stefanik and Trump endorsed Kent, a former Green Beret who narrowly lost to Gluesenkamp Perez in 2022.

Democrats are once again trying to paint Kent as extreme, launching attacks referring to reports of ties to right-wing groups, which Stefanik dismissed, saying she did not know the staffers referred to in those reports.

“I don’t endorse women just because they’re women,” Stefanik said when she was asked why she backed Kent, saying her team reviews polling and assesses potential paths to victory. Stefanik also said she knew Kent before he ran for Congress and worked to name a post office after his late wife, a New York native who was killed serving with the Navy in Syria.

“Joe Kent, I think, has done a very good job in rebuilding his team, on building name ID,” Stefanik said. “The polling that we were reviewing, he’s in a very strong position, which is why you have Marie Gluesenkamp Perez literally running away from any question about Joe Biden or Kamala Harris.”

As Republicans continue to try to build the number of GOP women in Congress, they are still struggling to win over female voters. The latest national NBC News poll found Harris leading Trump among women by 21 percentage points and congressional Democrats leading Republicans by 18 points.

“When it comes to women voters, we are focused on making inroads,” said Stefanik, who is a national co-chair of Women for Trump. She said Republicans have flipped House seats in part by appealing to female voters on economic issues and inflation.

Stefanik was confident not only that Republican women could grow their ranks but also that Republicans would hold on to the House. Her home state is key to the House majority, and she said New York incumbents are in strong positions.

“We’re not losing the House,” she said.

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com