Juliana Stratton’s win in Illinois exemplifies a changing Senate

Carol Moseley Braun became the first Black woman elected to the U.S. Senate in a watershed year for women candidates. This year, another woman from Illinois — Lt.

Juliana Stratton — made history again. Her win makes her the fifth Black woman ever elected to the U.S. Senate and cements Illinois as the first state to have two women of color in the Senate at the same time.

Her win also guarantees that, for the first time in history, three Black women will serve simultaneously in the upper chamber. Decision Desk HQ projected that Angie Nixon, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Florida, will lose to incumbent Ashley Moody. Stratton recently told The 19th’s Errin Haines that running for Senate as a Black woman can be daunting — but that she relied on support from Sens.

Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland and Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware, the two Black women serving in the upper chamber. How can you help me?’ Because a lot of times, it’s Black women doing that for other Black women.” The election of Stratton, who will replace retiring Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, demonstrates a legislative body that is slowly but surely becoming more diverse.

Whether or not Democrats flip control of the chamber, this year’s elections will reshape the face of an institution historically dominated by older White men and often likened to a country club. Women hold only 27 of the 100 seats in the Senate, and just 64 women have ever served since the chamber first convened in 1789, according to the Center for American Women and Politics. Of those senators, only five have been Black; Laphonza Butler was appointed to fill former Vice President Kamala Harris’ seat in 2021 but did not run for a full term.

Only three Asian-American and Pacific Islander women (Harris, Sen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and Sen. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii) and one Latina, Sen.