I have a dear friend, a dedicated professor whose commitment to the success of his students of color is unquestioned.
He works diligently with each to develop a long-term plan to fulfill their career goals and aspirations. Yet, when it comes to the appointment of the next United States Senator from California, he was adamant: “Barbara Lee does not speak for me.”
Rep. Barbara Lee is an elected official representing the East Bay in Washington, D.C. To my mind, Lee will forever be a profile in courage when she stood alone in the House of Representatives as the only vote against our entry into the Iraq War. Looking back on it: She was right. We invaded the wrong country, for the wrong reasons. History has vindicated her.
She paid a dear price. I remember how she was vilified at the time: called unpatriotic, a traitor, disloyal and worse. When she came to speak at my church in San Francisco, bodyguards flanked her, the threats to her life were so plentiful.
Today she is one of the prominent names mentioned for the appointment to the Senate, should Sen. Dianne Feinstein step down before her seat is up in 2024. Frontrunners vying for the seat are Rep. Adam Schiff of Los Angeles County and Rep. Katie Porter of Orange County.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has committed to naming a Black woman to the seat, should Feinstein stop down early. Only Lee fits that bill among the previously mentioned names.
If done, it would make Lee only the third Black woman to serve in the Senate – following Carol Mosely Braun and Kamala Harris. There are no current Black members right now.
Many point to Schiff’s high-profile leadership in the impeachment efforts against former President Donald Trump. Indeed, he proved a superb advocate, both in the House and as a frequent on-camera media guest explaining the law to the public.
Porter has proven a dogged protector of consumer rights by taking on banks and financial institutions, drawing attention to perceived misdeeds and wrongdoing.
If either of these two were to be appointed, it would not occupy the void that Lee could fill.
Looking back, 1992 was the “year of the woman.” Following the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, women rallied against him, feeling Roe vs. Wade was under attack.
The number of women running for and elected to the House and the Senate skyrocketed. California led the way with the election of two female senators: Feinstein, the former mayor of San Francisco, and Barbara Boxer, a 10-year veteran of the House of Representatives.
President George H. W. Bush, at a presidential debate at the University of Richmond, publicly stated when asked when his party might nominate a woman for president: “This is supposed to be the year of the woman in the Senate. Let’s see how they do. I hope a lot of them lose.”
Essentially, female candidates were told by many of the male elected representatives that there was no need to run to replace them. The implication was that they should just tell the men what they needed, and they would speak to female issues. That didn’t work then, and it doesn’t work now.
One prominent woman representative tells the story of her male colleagues bemoaning the trials and the labor of childbirth to the women in the room.
Isn’t the same analogy true without a single Black woman in the Senate who truly speaks for them? Millions of women, the base, the heart and the soul of the Democratic Party, whose lived experience is now represented through those who neither look like them nor have gone through what they have gone through.
I cannot deny the right of my friend to tell me, “Lee does not speak for me.” On the other hand, I would not deny the rights of millions of Black women for whom she does speak.
