Efforts to shrink the gender gap in the state legislature have made gains in recent years, but Pennsylvania still has work to do and is not keeping pace with many other states across the country.
In fact, while women have increased their representation in state legislatures from 2016 to 2025, Pennsylvania currently ranks only 31 out of the 50 states with 32.4% female state lawmakers, according to The Center for American Women and Politics.
Three states – Nevada, New Mexico and Colorado – have actually achieved gender parity in their state legislatures. In Pennsylvania’s legislature, women account for 28.1% of Republican state legislators and 36.8% of Democratic lawmakers. In comparison, Utah was 1st with Democratic women 75% and Republican women at only 20.7%; Mississippi was last with Democratic women 17% and Republican women at 13%.
Nevertheless, as a whole women only make up one-third of all state legislators even though they represent about 50 percent of the general population. And gains across the country have largely been led by Democratic women, who comprise 34.1% of state legislatures. Republican women on the other hand only account for 21.3% – a statistic that experts say is the result of a systemic failure to invest in female candidates.
CAWP recently found that Democratic women are now nearly equal in number to Democratic men in state legislatures, up from the 34.1% they comprised in 2016. But women only make up 21.3% of all Republicans in state legislatures. Experts say the gains made by Democrats can in part be attributed to the intentional effort to recruit and train women to run for office.
“PA has made significant progress in the number of women serving in the PA General Assembly,” said Gwen Stoltz, executive director of Represent PA. “Ten years ago I believe there were only nine women in the PA State Senate and today 19 out of 50 senators are women.”
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Represent PA is an organization in Pennsylvania focused on investing in pro-choice Democratic women candidates across the commonwealth for both the PA House and Senate. Stoltz was named its new executive director in September.
Stoltz added that in the PA State House there has also been a spike in women’s representation from 10 years ago, rising from 38 to 63 out of the 203 members – and currently with a Black woman Speaker of the House.
While the legislature is still not reflective of the over 50% women population in PA, she said women have made significant gains.
“Women continue to face barriers when they step up to run for office – financial barriers, work and family life balance issues, and others,” said Stoltz. “Represent PA is dedicated to trying to remove barriers that women face by providing early support to pro-choice Democratic candidates that step up and are willing to put in the work necessary to run (and win) for the PA General Assembly.”
Stoltz said they need to continue to support women when they step up to run for office.
“Increasing support by providing needed funds to build campaign infrastructure, offering training, and frankly offering a network of friendly faces to lift them up when the campaign gets tough because inevitably running for office is challenging,” she said.
“Women continue to face barriers when they step up to run for office – financial barriers, work and family life balance issues, and others.” – Gwen Stoltz, Executive Director of Represent PA
Rep. Tina Davis, the only Democratic woman in Bucks County’s state delegation (there are three Republican women: State Representatives Shelby Labs, Kristin Marcell, and KC Tomlinson), co-founded Emerge PA 10 years ago to empower Democratic women leaders who reflect the communities they serve to run for elected office — and win. Rep. Mary Jo Daley was very intrigued by it, so she became Davis’ co-founder. Daley was first elected to represent Montgomery County’s 148th Legislative District in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 2012.
“Since then, we’ve had 10 classes of about 25 women in each class,” said Davis. “It’s a cohort style training and they (the women) are able to run for any position – whether it’s school board all the way up to president.”
To date, 16 Bucks County women have gone through Emerge Pennsylvania’s virtual training. Two women are running for office in 2026; seven women were elected to positions and seven women ran for office and lost.
Davis said the women go through an intense interview process and application. “We really try to get quality women and most of them work so honestly, it’s the timing,” she said. “We do some (training) on Zoom because we do the whole state and then we do some trainings in person in Philly, a few in Harrisburg, and then a couple in Pittsburgh.”
The training is a six-month program that the women leaders have to commit to. Davis said their overall success rate of the women getting elected to public office roles is almost 75% to 80%.
About 200 women have been trained thus far.
Prominent leaders who have done the training include Maria Collett, Carolyn Comitta and Katie J. Muth in the State Senate as well as Melissa Schusterman and Jennifer O’Mara in the State House.
“It teaches you all the nuts and bolts of running including campaign finance, how to speak and what to speak,” said Davis.
Davis said the biggest challenges for these women are travel (for those who live far from the Capital), young children and exposing their family to the public. These are recurring themes why women may shy away from running.
Madeline Zann has been serving as the Executive Director of the Pennsylvania House Democratic Campaign Committee since February 2024. This committee also trains women in the state.
Zann estimates an average of two to three Bucks Country women go through their training each year. Training is a mix of in person and via Zoom.
The committee hasn’t done any sessions yet this year. Zann said they can be in Harrisburg or via Zoom – they’ll do some in-person training in districts or regions.
Training is one-on-one of running for office – how the campaign field works, campaign finance, communications, etc.
Zann said the committee reelected a number of women last year including their chair Tina Davis, “though we weren’t incredibly worried about her seat.”
Challenges with implementing this training? “Time is always a big thing,” said Zann. “The logistics of it all. Usually candidates have another job, they have families or all of the above so finding the time to squeeze it all in.”
The Associated Press contributed reporting to this article.
