About the Event | Sponsorship Levels | About our Panelists
The Ms. Virtual Event features an engaging panel discussion with historians, gender gap experts, and feminist leaders. Join us as we celebrate the 100th anniversary of women’s voting rights, and explore how women’s voting power will impact the critical 2020 elections.
Anna Sampaio
Dr. Anna Sampaio is Director and Professor of Ethnic Studies and Political Science at Santa Clara University specializing in studying and writing about Latina/o political activism and participation. Outside the university she has worked extensively with campaigns, community based groups, and non-profit organizations in Colorado, New Jersey, and California including ACLU, the Latina Initiative, the Hispanic Leadership Council, the American Friends Service Committee, NARAL, Padres Unidos, and the Denver Election Commission. Her recent book Terrorizing Latina/o Immigrants: Race, Gender, and Immigration Politics in the Age of Security (Temple University Press, 2015), won the 2016 American Political Science Association award for the Best New Book in Latina/o Politics.
Kelly Dittmar
Dr. Kelly Dittmar is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University–Camden and Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) at the Eagleton Institute of Politics. Dittmar’s research focuses on gender and American political institutions. She is the co-author of A Seat at the Table: Congresswomen’s Perspectives on Why Their Representation Matters (Oxford University Press, 2018) (with Kira Sanbonmatsu and Susan J. Carroll) and author of Navigating Gendered Terrain: Stereotypes and Strategy in Political Campaigns (Temple University Press, 2015). At CAWP, Dittmar manages national research projects, helps to develop and implement CAWP’s research agenda, contributes to CAWP reports, publications, and analyses, and works with CAWP’s programs for women’s public leadership.
Jennifer Carroll Foy
Delegate Jennifer Carroll Foy was the chief sponsor of the Equal Rights Amendment ratification bill in the Virginia House of Delegates. With Virginia’s passage in January 2020, three quarters of states have ratified the ERA, making the amendment eligible to be added to the U.S. Constitution. A graduate of the Virginia Military Institute as a member of the third class of female cadets ever to attend VMI, and a public defender, Jennifer was first elected to the House of Delegates in Virginia in 2017 in a seat long held by Republicans, in an election in which Democrats flipped 15 seats in the House. Foy was a leading advocate for Medicaid expansion in Virginia, raising the minimum wage and teacher salaries, and criminal justice reform.
Eleanor (Ellie) Smeal
As Co-Founder and President of the Feminist Majority Foundation and former President of the National Organization for Women (NOW), Ellie has played a pivotal role in defining the debate, developing the strategies, and charting the direction of the modern day women’s movement for nearly five decades. She was the first to identify the “gender gap” – the difference in the way women and men vote and view issues – and popularized its usage in election and polling analyses to enhance women’s voting clout. Ellie has been an activist leader in the passage of landmark legislation, such as the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, Equal Credit Act, Violence Against Women Act, and Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. She led the fight for the U.S. ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment (from 1977-1982), and is in the leadership of the current efforts to pass the ERA.
Bridget Quinn
Bridget Quinn will moderate. Bridget is author of the forthcoming book She Votes: How U.S. Women Won Suffrage, and What Happened Next. This is not your average history of women’s rights. It’s a collection of heart-pounding scenes and keenly observed portraits. Bridget Quinn tells an intersectional story of the women who won suffrage, and those who have continued to raise their voices for equality ever since—from Elizabeth Cady Stanton to Audre Lorde, and from the first female Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation to the first woman to wear pants on the Senate floor. Bridget is the author of the award-winning Broad Strokes: 15 Women Who Made Art and Made History (in That Order), an Amazon pick for Best Art & Photography Books 2017 and a 2018 Amelia Bloomer List selection of recommended feminist literature from the American Library Association.