10


The HBCU Advocate


Volume 2 Number 3 Career and Business Opportunities


Lack of Racial Diversity Among Top Staff Positions in U.S. House of Representatives


Congressional Black Caucus. “We found that Congressional


Dr. Elsie Scott, director of the Ronald W. Walters Leadership and Public Policy Center BY MISHA CORNELIUS


WASHINGTON – A new study reveals a disturbing lack of racial diversity among top staff in the U.S. House of Representatives. The report, co-authored by Elsie Scott, Ph.D., founding director of the Ronald W. Walters Leadership and Public


Policy Center at


Howard University, finds that the American public is more likely to elect a person of color to the House than House members are to hire a person of color for top staff positions.


“The top staff positions we looked at, chief of staff, legislative


director, and communications director, provide critical direction to the members they work for, by recommending


legislation they


should support and interpreting what the office is doing to the public,” says Scott. “In Memphis, Tenn., the one district in the country that is majority black, isn’t represented by an African-Amer- ican member of congress and has no people of color in the three top positions.”


The study also found


that much of the Democrats’ staff diversity comes from the


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Black Caucus members are more likely to hire people of color than any other members,” says Scott, who is also a former president and chief executive of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation. “The timing of the study really honors the work of Ronald W. Walters who was a top advisor to the founding members of CBC.”


According to a press release by The Joint Center for Political and Economic


the detailed


Diversity Among Top U.S. House Staff:”


Almost a three-quarters of


House Members—313 members— have no top staff of color;


Over a quarter of members—114


members—represent districts that are over a third people of color but do not have any top staff of color;


Much of the Democrats’


staff diversity comes from the Congressional Black Caucus. While 53 percent of Congressional Black


Studies who released report titled


Caucus members’ top staffers are Black, only 2 percent of White Democratic members’ top staffers are Black;


Almost Democratic 40 percent Conference of the Congressional


Hispanic Caucus members and half of the Republican Congressional Hispanic


members


have no Latino top staff; There are no Latinos, Asian


“Racial


American Pacific Islanders, or Native Americans in any of the 40 committee staff director positions or in any of the 24 top staff positions in the four top leadership offices of Democrats and Republicans; and


Women account for almost


61 percent of Black top staffers, almost 45 percent of Latina/o top staffers, and just over 31 percent of AAPI top staffers.


Karra W. McCray, also


co-authored the report, while earning her master’s degree in political science from Howard University.


September/October 2018


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