[music]

Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good Monday morning, everyone. USA Today, Washington Bureau Chief, Susan Page, covers Washington, duh, and writes biographies of strong women in American politics and media. Nancy Pelosi, most recently, a book on TV journalist, Barbara Walter, soon to come, and her previous one of Barbara Bush. You may not be surprised that she's taken an interest recently in how the record number of women in the new Congress are doing so far and if they're doing anything differently as a group, and in Nikki Haley entering the Republican presidential primary field, the only person so far to challenge Donald Trump.

Didn't take long for a CNN anchor to say on TV that at age 51, Haley has passed her prime. We'll also touch on one woman in Congress making news by calling for a national divorce, as she calls it, red states and blue states in an amicable breakup. Susan Page is here to talk about all of it. Thanks for coming on, Susan. As always, welcome back to WNYC.

Susan Page: Hey. It's great to be with you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: I'll do the spoiler right away for people who don't know and say, the congresswoman calling for a national divorce is none other than Marjorie Taylor Greene. Is she just trying to own the libs as they say or is she actually proposing something?

Susan Page: Well, I think she's actually proposing something, and I say that because she said it not once on Twitter but over and over again, and then she doubled down and tripled down in interviews on television. I'm not sure if she fully understands what a national divorce would mean, to most people, that sounds like a civil war, but she is Marjorie Taylor Greene. She gets the prize as the most for making, I think, the most outrageous statements in Congress this year. That is a feat given, George Santos and others who are competing for that prize.

Brian Lehrer: Huh. The only reason I bring it up at all, because we usually ignore Marjorie Taylor Greene's ridiculousness, is that this idea has come up from both sides at one time or another. You remember after Trump was elected, the writer, Kevin Baker, wrote an article in the New Republic called Bluexit much discussed at the time he was on this show. He was everywhere reminding Democrats that the blue states tend to be the wealthier states that disproportionately pay most of the federal taxes, hello, New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut, hello, out there in California, Illinois, while the Red States ironically call for smaller government but get most of the government spending.

You want to take your guns and your no abortion rights and your limited health insurance and go have your own right-wing country? Please, go, was the message there. Now we have Marjorie Taylor Greene making these headlines. Do you think this could ever happen? Does it interest you at all as a solution to anything?

Susan Page: No, I don't think it could happen. Marjorie Taylor Greene isn't wrong that we are a pretty divided nation right now, but you only have to look at her home state of Georgia to raise some questions about this. I'm sure she thinks of herself as coming from a red state. It's a state that voted for Joe Biden last time around. It's become a very purple state so which side of this dividing line will she put her own state?

Look, number one, it's unconstitutional. We settled that with the last civil war. Number two, it defies the idea of America as a diverse and complicated place where we hang together on some fundamental principles, and so I think we should not take this seriously as a proposal, but I think we have to take seriously the idea that we have divisions in our nation that we really need to address.

Brian Lehrer: Moving on from Marjorie Taylor Greene. Besides her, there are 152 other women in Congress right now. The Pew Research Center did a nice breakdown of some numbers and through history, so I'm just going to read from their page and then ask you to talk about it. 28% of Congress a record is now women. It's not 50%, obviously, but 28% is 153 out of 540 members. Little history around that. In 1928, there were only 7 women out of 500+ in Congress, less than a decade after women were first allowed to vote at that time, and that was a record at that time. Seven. It's gone up gradually to today's 153.

Of the 59 women who have ever served in the Senate, 43 of those 59 have been elected just in the last 30 years. This does not break down evenly by party. This is the part I'm going to ask you to talk about, Susan. 22 women were newly elected to Congress last November, 15 Democrats and 7 Republicans, and maybe the bottom line stat from Pew on women and political party, women are 41% of the Democrats in Congress now, so nearing 50%, but just 16% of the Republican is in Congress. Susan, what might that gender gap represent about the voters of each party?

Susan Page: Brian, one thing that's interesting to note is that when Nancy Pelosi was first elected to Congress in 1987, the number of women in the Republican and Democratic parties who were members of Congress were roughly even. It's really been a modern phenomenon that Democrats put a focus on recruiting, encouraging women to run for investing in their campaigns and electing them. EMILY's List was part of that. Pelosi herself was part of that.

While Republicans not only did not recruit and finance women, many Republicans oppose the idea of what they called identity politics as something that wasn't important, that people should be elected on their merit, not their gender. What we found in 2018, there were 13 Republican women in Congress that was the worst in a quarter century. That prompted some Republican women, including Elise Stefanik from New York to start to focus on electing Republican women. They've greatly increased the number from 2018, but they are well behind where Democrats are in terms of the representation of women in Congress.

Brian Lehrer: Maybe it's worth saying out loud, and tell me if you agree, that it's really less about gender as we often see in American politics and more about race. White women voted majority for Trump in both elections after all.

Susan Page: Yes. Well, race is definitely part of the calculation in every aspect of American politics, including the representation of women. One thing that's important to note is democratic women are driving the increasing diversity of Congress as well. There are, I think, 29 women, Black women who have been elected to Congress. Let me see if I have these numbers here somewhere. Yes. 29 Black women are in the current Congress, 20 Latina women, 11 Asian American and Pacific Islander women.

We now have women who represent Indigenous Americans represented in Congress. This is an aspect of this growing diversity in Congress, both in gender and in race and ethnicity, and also in life experience. This is why I think some people think it's important to have a diverse Congress because you know who noticed first that there was a shortage of baby formula on grocery shelves? It was women in Congress who had young children.

Brian Lehrer: Wasn't Mitch McConnell, huh?

Susan Page: [laughs] It was not Mitch McConnell.

Brian Lehrer: If you're just joining us, my guest is Washington bureau chief for USA Today, Susan Page, who also is a biographer of Nancy Pelosi among others. Is there a Congressional women's caucus like there are other caucuses that cross party lines around a group in this case?

Susan Page: There is not a woman's caucus in Congress, but there are a lot of examples of women working across party lines on issues like, for instance, a sexual assault in the military, forcing the armed forces to handle those allegations in a different way. It was a bipartisan group of women that forced the National Institutes of Health to establish a center on women's health. Just now, we have a new bipartisan caucus in Congress working on family issues, including paid family leave. That's important because almost nothing is going to happen in this new Congress in the next two years, but if you can get a bipartisan coalition that is politically diverse and diverse in philosophy behind an issue like paid family leave, it's possible you might get something done.

Brian Lehrer: Well, do you see any possibility for a standalone paid family leave bill to get through this current Congress? I've asked this question of a number of people in Congress. I've asked Senator Gillibrand a number of times who's a big proponent of paid family leave. It was in President Biden's big Build Back Better Bill which mostly failed and so it got eliminated in that context. I would think it would be so popular across party lines, given the need for childcare in this country and the economic stresses on most families most of the time. Could a standalone paid family leave bill succeed in the current Congress, in your opinion?

Susan Page: I think probably not, but maybe you should get caught trying.

Brian Lehrer: Nikki Haley, Republican woman, does she cite the glass ceiling like Hillary Clinton sometimes did, her supporters sometimes more often did or is there a Republican contradiction, highlighting first woman is important while denouncing anything having to do with identity? I think Democrats call it representation and then Republicans derisively call it identity politics of marginalized groups.

Susan Page: Here, I'll tell you why Nikki Haley is not focused on breaking the glass ceiling. We did a poll in December that found that among Republicans, 50% said their ideal presidential candidate was male, 2% said their ideal presidential candidate was female. That is--

Brian Lehrer: What was the male number? Oh, did we lose Susan's line?

Susan Page: Hi. I'm sorry. Am I back?

Brian Lehrer: Yes, yes, you were on mute, I think.

Susan Page: I'm sorry.

Brian Lehrer: What was the percentage that said the ideal presidential candidate is male?

Susan Page: 50% of Republicans said the ideal presidential candidate was male. 2% said the ideal presidential candidate was female. That is not the basis for Nikki Haley to argue that it would be a great thing for her to be the first female presidential candidate in the GOP.

Brian Lehrer: Should I assume that the other 48% said, "Doesn't matter?"

Susan Page: That is correct. Yes. Overall, we found that most Americans said it didn't matter, but among those who cared, by 2:1, they'd preferred a man. Among Republicans, that opinion was very strongly held.

Brian Lehrer: Then there's the Don Lemon comment, the CNN morning host defending Biden, I guess, from Haley saying, "Biden has passed his prime," retorting that "Nikki Haley has passed her prime at 51 because women are considered in their prime in the 20s and 30s and maybe 40s." That's a direct quote from Don Lemon. Oh, no, Don Lemon. You didn't really do that, did you? But he did.

Susan Page: Don Lemon, who is five years older than Nikki Haley, by the way.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, Don Lemon is five years older.

Susan Page: Don Lemon, five years older than Nikki Haley. How about you, Brian? Do you feel that you're in your prime?

Brian Lehrer: Oh, yes. I'm definitely in my prime, and I'm older than Nikki Haley, but-

Susan Page: Me too.

Brian Lehrer: -you being you and you being a biographer of strong Washington women, how did you react when he said that?

Susan Page: I thought two things. I thought it was an outrageous thing to say, and I thought it was also a view that a lot of Americans hold. One thing Don Lemon said as he was trying to dig a deeper hole for himself, he said, "You can Google it." I Googled it, when is a woman in her prime? There's a lot of Google responses that said pretty much what he said. This is outrageous and yet not, in fact, I think an uncommon view for women in politics, for women in business. By the way, for women in the news media, women who are in television news say it is much harder to age as a woman on TV, as an anchor than it is for a man, and that is also been true in politics.

Brian Lehrer: I guess one of the enduring stereotypes is that older men as they age, maybe, especially if they were publicly known as younger men, are more likely to be perceived as distinguished-looking as they age, whereas women are more likely to be perceived as past their prime on television.

Susan Page: Yes, I think that's right. I think it's part of the way women are more harshly judged on everything, from the tone of their voice to the clothes they wear.

Brian Lehrer: You point out in your article on this, that when Bill Clinton was elected at 46, people questioned if he was too young to be president. By the Don Lemon standard, that wouldn't leave much of a window between too young and too old for women candidates. Would it?

Susan Page: You'd have like six months there if they hit. We asked Americans what the ideal age of a president was in this poll we took in December. Half of Americans said in their 50s. By that standard, Nikki Haley is right in the sweet spot.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, but she's also running on what a lot of people consider atheist. I think the one thing from her presidential announcement that has made the most news is that she actually proposed mandatory mental competency tests for politicians over 75.

Susan Page: Speaking of ideas that won't go anywhere, along with the national divorce, I would say mandatory competencies test that would involve, by the way, both President Biden and Donald Trump, not an accident, I suspect, on Nicki Haley's part.

Brian Lehrer: I suspect. All right. We've done national divorce, we've done mandatory mental competency tests, Susan Page, biographer of Nancy Pelosi and Barbara Bush. When's the book coming out about Barbara Walters?

Susan Page: It's nine months. It's due to my publisher in May. Wish me luck in getting it done.

Brian Lehrer: You managed to cover DC, be the Washington Bureau chief, come on this show very generously, fairly often, and still have time to write a book. Amazing. Susan Page, always great to have you.

Susan Page: Thank you, Brian.

Copyright © 2023 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.