Women in the United States House of Representatives

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Women have served in the United States House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the United States Congress, since 1917 following the election of Republican Jeannette Rankin from Montana, the first woman in Congress.^[1] In total, 376 women have been U.S. representatives and seven more have been non-voting delegates. As of November 28, 2023, there are 126 women in the U.S. House of Representatives (not including four female non-voting delegates), making women 29.0% of the total.^[2] Of the 383 women who have served in the House, 251 have been Democrats (including four from U.S. territories and the District of Columbia) and 132 have been Republicans (including three from U.S. territories, including pre-statehood Hawaii). One woman was the 52nd Speaker of the House, Democrat Nancy Pelosi of California.

Women have been elected to the House of Representatives from 48 of the 50 states. The states that have not elected a woman to the House of Representatives are Mississippi and North Dakota; both have sent women to the United States Senate. In 1917, Montana was the first state to send a woman to the House of Representatives and to Congress; in 2023, Vermont became the most recent state to send its first woman to the House and to Congress. Women have also been sent to Congress from five of the six territories of the United States; the only territory that has not sent a woman to the House of Representatives is the Northern Mariana Islands. California has elected more women to Congress than any other state, with 46 U.S. representatives elected since 1923. To date, no woman who has served in the House has ever previously been a senator, been elected to represent more than one state in non-consecutive elections, switched parties, or served as a third-party member in her career, although one was reelected as an Independent.