Jacky Rosen on Health Care, the Second Amendment, and Brett Kavanaugh

Historically, women have needed to be convinced to enter politics. But within weeks of the 2016 presidential election, thousands of women announced they planned to run. And we want them to win. So we’re giving them a monthly example of a woman who has run. The point: You can, too.

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With the midterm elections only a few weeks away, the country is looking to a few select states to determine who will take control of the Senate. While it seems Republicans will most likely keep their majority, the Democrats do have a few places where they can pick up seats. One of those states? Nevada, where Democratic Rep. Jacky Rosen is running against longtime Republican incumbent Dean Heller. Rosen has represented Nevada in the House since 2017, and now she’s the only woman in a competitive Senate race challenging a male incumbent. (And, yes, she’s already received her own sexist nickname from President Trump.) Here, she discusses what led her to public service and why Heller is on the wrong side of history:

I graduated high school in 1974 when Roe v. Wade had only just been passed. Ms. Magazine was only just starting, and women were really feeling empowered to pursue their dreams and their careers, and I was excited to enter a new field of technology. Of course we didn’t know in the early ‘70s and ‘80s for sure what it was going to become. But it was very exciting. Thinking I’d be in politics just wasn’t something I’d thought of as a younger woman. There just weren’t a lot of role models there.

Women don’t often take that straight path in their career. I am a granddaughter of immigrants, put myself through college as a waitress, and I started my career as a computer programmer. There weren’t very many women in tech in the ‘80s, and there still aren’t enough. When this district came open and there was an opportunity to take all of the things that I felt about my community and put all my experience together, I thought it was a great opportunity to serve. I was an empty-nester, my parents and in-laws had passed away, and it was the right time for me to start a new chapter.

My good friend [former congresswoman] Shelley Berkley was a member of my synagogue. I’ve known her for many years, so I talked to her about what it was like for her to hold her office. I called other women that were holding office when I was thinking about it, and I reached out to other members of Congress and just other members inside the community.

[Here’s] what they told me about holding federal office, especially for Congress and the Senate. I listen to large businesses, like our big hospitals and hotels. I go to our county hospitals, all of our universities, our high schools. And you realize that as you collect the stories, as you collect the worries and fears and goals and desires and aspirations of individuals and businesses large and small, it tells you a story. We’re able to help them, advocate for them, and then I take those stories and go to Washington and try to turn them into legislation. And that really spoke to me as something I wanted to do.

Early on, I began my congressional career. [I heard] more and more stories, especially around health care. I took care of my parents and in-laws as they aged and went through heart attacks and Alzheimer’s and cancer and navigating chronic disease and Medicare and social security. And so I heard those stories from so many people. Kids came to visit me who had juvenile diabetes, and I realized that Dean Heller is clearly letting Nevada families down. He clearly wasn’t listening to what was going on with people in Nevada and wasn’t considering what was important to them. So I decided that in this place and this time, I could take those stories and try to stand up and show Nevada there’s somebody who is going to listen to them in places where Dean Heller isn’t.

I think that everyone thinks there’s no path to taking back the majority in the Senate that doesn’t run through Nevada, so of course there’s pressure there. I think overall people want a check and balance on what this administration is doing. They want a check and balance on some of these reckless immigration policies that are separating children from their parents, they want a check and balance on—I can tell you particularly—pre-existing conditions. My phone has been ringing off the hook from parents and grandparents talking to me about their kids or grandkids. If any legislation goes through that takes away the protections for pre-existing conditions then people feel—and this is true—that it’s maybe a death sentence for their loved one because they won’t be able to get life-saving medication or treatment. And that’s frightening everyone I talk to.

We’re in the west, and we have a rich history of gun ownership and hunting, but people here across the state understand the difference between public safety and personal ownership and that we can have both if we protect the second amendment. So after the [Las Vegas] shooting, where over 20,000 people were at that concert, thousands of people who work in our hotel industry, all the first responders, ambulance drivers, hospital workers, everyone was so affected, and so we understand that need for commercial background checks, the need to limit the capacity of magazines. I think it becomes very personal, and you understand that you can fully support the second amendment in a way where people can hunt and collect, sport shoot, all those things they want to do. And what we have to do, especially here in Nevada where we have over 50 million tourists here across our state, is protect the health and safety of our residents.

Heller’s unwavering support of Judge Kavanaugh, it really sent a chilling message to survivors of sexual assault and their families that their experiences don’t matter, that they won’t be believed. And that the president actually makes fun of someone who comes forward? That’s just not the message that we want. We want to take care of people who have had any kind of assault happen to them. And I really believe that Dean Heller is on the wrong side of this. He even called Dr. Ford’s allegation a “hiccup.” That he supported his nomination no matter what. It’s not what the men and women I talk to want. And it’s very disappointing that he would be a rubber stamp for the president on this issue.

[When] I was a first time candidate, I had a lot to learn. Now I’ve been in Washington for a couple of years. I’ve won a race, but I do think that there is a momentum on the Democratic side and on the independent non-partisans. I also have a lot of Republicans who have come to talk to me, and they feel that this isn’t their party anymore and that they are a party of exclusion. They want education for their kids, they want protection from pre-existing conditions, they want women to have reproductive choices. They don’t want to deny LGBT communities from being married, they’re worried about the environment, clean air, clean water. And so people feel that there’s a high anxiety. We’re under attack in a lot of ways in our homes and our communities, and they want someone who’s going to stand up and fight back.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.