Grassroots in Alabama: An emerging women's movement
In the lead up to the special election in December, Brown and local women organized a protest against Moore dressed in the red cloaks and white bonnets of "handmaids" — women held as men's property in the dystopian novel and TV series, "The Handmaid's Tale."
Doug Jones won a hard-fought victory in a campaign watched nationwide. And Heather Brown realized she was just getting started.
"I never dreamed that this little 'handmaid' protest we were doing would change my life," she said. "When we had that big win with Doug Jones, it was like, 'Oh, we can do it!' You know, the little things we were doing helped bring about that win."
She decided to run for office herself, seeking a a seat on the Baldwin County Commission as part of a wave of new Democratic candidates challenging the local Republican power structure.
Brown is one of nine Democrats — five of them women — now running for office in a county where the party hasn't had local candidates on the ballot in more than a decade.
"I decided to run because I want to be the change, not just talk about being the change," she declared.
It's part of a trend seen nationwide as more women jump into political races to make their voices heard. According to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, so far this year 233 women have filed to run for U.S. Senate, House and governors races, and another 350 are considered likely to file soon — numbers that would break records.
But the newly energized Democrats in Alabama have their work cut out for them. Alabama is one of the reddest of red states, giving President Trump 62.9 percent of the vote in 2016.
"To be blue here in sea of red, you are seriously outnumbered. It takes a lot of conversation, a lot of relationship building, to show we're not really all that different," Brown said.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbsn-originals-grassroots-in-alabama-emerging-womens-movement/
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