By Aleena Fayaz, Renée Rigdon, Amy O’Kruk

(CNN) — After this year’s historic blue wave, more women than ever before are set to serve in the next Congress.

The new record — 159 women from both parties — is seven more women than currently serve in the House and Senate, according to data from the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University and CNN election projections.

And next year’s freshmen are a diverse cohort, including the first female Native American senator, Colorado’s first Black female representative and the first Hispanic representative from Nebraska.

But while the wins will increase women’s representation to 30% when the 120th Congress convenes in January, they’ll still be about 100 seats shy of gender parity. And the gains aren’t across the board — they’re among Democratic women and mostly in the House, where women are breaking a new record. The number of women in the Senate will decrease.

And for Republicans in both chambers, the new Congress will bring what one strategist called a “crisis-level decline.”

Outside of Congress, women saw success at other levels of government too: a record-breaking 17 women will serve as governors, with several races still left to project. They include Georgia’s Keisha Lance Bottoms, who’s the first Black woman ever elected governor.

“It’s a seismic, generational sea change,” said Jessica Mackler, the president of EMILY’s List, which formed in 1985 to help elect Democratic women who support abortion rights. “It’s not just about the volume; it’s about… infusing the halls of power in this country with a new generation of leadership.”

CNN has not yet projected winners in all races, so it’s possible the number of women could change. Mississippi’s Senate race, for example, is too close to call. GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith — who was the first woman elected to Congress from the Magnolia State — faced a tough challenge from Democrat Scott Colom, who could become the state’s first Black senator since the Reconstruction era. And it remains too early to call Alaska’s Senate race — where Democrat Mary Peltola is trying to unseat GOP Sen. Dan Sullivan. Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn is expected to resign after winning the governorship in her state.

Regardless of the outcomes of Hyde-Smith’s and Peltola’s races, the number of women senators will drop from current levels. In the House, women will set a new record with at least 136.

But the gains, even if far short of achieving gender parity, could have a policy impact.

“Women get there and they’re in the room when conversations are being had about healthcare, and they say, ‘Hey, maybe we should do some tests on women,’” said Kelly Dittmar, the director of research and scholar at CAWP.

“[Women] prioritize bringing other diverse voices to the table, partly because they knew what it was like to be excluded,” she added.

A big Democratic pool

In the House, Democratic women will far surpass the current 95 who are serving. But the number of Republican women in the chamber is falling, as is the case in the Senate.

Women’s representation in Congress is lopsided toward Democrats, even more so after this year’s election results, when at least 116 Democrats are headed to the House compared to 19 Republicans.

The partisan disparity is consistent with historical trends, given the Democratic Party has often placed a higher priority on recruiting and funding female candidates, in large part through EMILY’s List.

After President Donald Trump’s 2016 victory, a surge of female candidates ran for office in 2018, resulting in 36 non-incumbent women being elected to the House — and breaking the record of 24 non-incumbent women elected in 1992 following Anita Hill’s testimony, according to CAWP.

All but one of those women elected in 2018 was a Democrat, which became a serious wake-up call for the GOP that resulted in record-breaking success for GOP women in 2020.

“We are once again facing a crisis-level decline in Republican women in Congress,” Danielle Barrow, executive director of Winning for Women Action Fund, which works to elect GOP women, said in a statement after last week’s election results.

“It is time for party leaders to treat this as a permanent strategy, not a crisis response. The map in 2028 is favorable and the opportunity is real, but recruitment must start today,” she added.

There is a direct relationship between sweeping wins for women and Democrats, according to Michele Swers, professor of Congress, women and politics at Georgetown University.

“I’m not surprised because when Democrats have a good year historically, women have a good year,” Swers said, noting that as women accrue seniority, they’re more likely to have the financial networks to boost others.

It was, undeniably, a good year for Democrats, who flipped seats in deep-red territory by capitalizing on Trump’s historic unpopularity — which explains part of the decline amongst Republican women.

“We should not confuse a national rejection of the party’s direction and message with a rejection of its female candidates,” Julie Conway — executive director of VIEW PAC, which works to elect Republican women — told CNN in an email.

And in this political environment, women were particularly well positioned to connect with voters’ frustration with rising prices, Mackler said.

Democratic Rep.-elect Rebecca Bennett, a former Navy helicopter pilot who flipped New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District, said her experience as a mom raising daughters helped her understand voters’ cost-of-living concerns.

Bennett is one of at least 11 female veterans who will serve in the 120th Congress, the most in US history, including newly elected Democrats Cait Conley and JoAnna Mendoza, who won their races in New York and Arizona, respectively. Their victories are reminiscent of the national security women elected to the House in 2018, some of whom have ascended to higher office, like Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan and Govs. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia and Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey.

Swers said Democratic women veteran candidates have found success in part because they defy the assumptions that both Democrats and women are soft on national security.

“If you can recruit women who have national security experience, right, you get the benefits of their moral authority on national security and their moral authority as women and caregivers in the public mind,” she said.

GOP women have also run on their veteran experience — two of the 11 female veterans who will serve next year are Republican — or have leaned into their experience as moms, like Rep. Ashley Hinson of Iowa, who lost her bid for Senate in a Trump state.

But as the party looks to build its bench for a more favorable political environment, recruiting good candidates, Conway said, is only half the battle. The key, she added, is early financial support and a willingness to engage conservative female candidates in competitive primaries so they can make it to the general election.

“We owe these women, and the women who will follow them, more than a post-election autopsy. We owe them a serious commitment to doing the work,” Conway said.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.