Simone Biles just did something no other woman has done before. On Thursday, Deadspin reported, the Olympic gymnast competed at the selection camp for the upcoming world championships, which will take place in Doha, Qatar. When it was her turn, Biles performed a vault that the site described as the Cheng vault (a “roundoff onto the board and half turn onto the table…with only one and a half twists off”) with an extra half twist. According to Deadspin, this variation on the Cheng vault has only ever been successfully performed in competition by male gymnasts, which means Biles just broke an incredible record.
Previously, Deadspin reported that the enhanced vault will be dubbed the “Biles” if she ends up performing it at the world championships. And it looks like she’ll be performing the move again later this month, because on Friday ESPN reported that the four-time gold medalist was announced to be headlining the team, which will be competing on behalf of Team USA in Doha.
According to ESPN, Biles’ teammates will include Morgan Hurd, Ragan Smith, Riley McCusker, Grace McCallum, and Kara Eaker. Hurd is a 2017 world all-around champion; Smith is a 2017 U.S. champion.
This is far from the first time Biles has made history. In August 2016, she became the first-ever female gymnast to lead Team USA in an Olympic closing ceremony, and only the second gymnast to ever have the honor (with the last having done so in 1936). Then, this past August she became the second woman ever to win five U.S. all-around titles, as well as the first one in 24 years to win gold in all four apparatus titles.
Campaigns are like marathons: Both are races, with a distant finish line on the horizon. Both are slogs, the kind that can drive someone blind with delirium and push her harder than she believed possible. Both are a process and a practice and an ordeal. So to complete one, whether it lasts 26.2 miles or 18 months, much of the same advice applies: Hit the trail. Drink a lot of water. And if at all possible, run with a friend.
This November, a record number of women will run for office—not just for the House of Representatives or the Senate, but for school boards and in gubernatorial races, too. Not all will win, but if even some fraction of them succeeds, legislative bodies will look (and likely vote) differently than they do now. In a midterm preview, Reuterstook Michigan as an example: In 2016, just 23 percent of lawmakers across the state were women. In 2018, women are on the ballot in 63 percent of state senate seats and 71 percent of state house seats. If trends hold, Reuters anticipates that women could make up to 40 percent of the state legislature, an all-time record.
The promise of a female-led political movement has incentivized a not unprecedented, but noticeable collaborative spirit between women candidates. Michigan’s Rashida Tlaib, who is poised to become the first Muslim woman ever in the House of Representatives if she wins in November (which is all but certain considering she has no Republican opponent) has stumped for Ilhan Omar, the Somali-American who could share that title with her if she wins in Minnesota. Deb Haaland, who’s running for a House seat in New Mexico and is Native American, has gone on the road with Sharice Davids, also a Native woman, who is up for a seat in Kansas.
Amanda Litman, the co-founder and executive director of Run for Something, an organization that aims to recruit and support progressive candidates, has come to see relationships like these as a measure of campaign preparedness. When the PAC endorses candidates, Litman connects them over Slack—an internal messaging platform—to others in similar races, people who understand the particularities and peculiarities of electoral politics.
“I once saw a tweet that was like, ‘Behind every strong woman is a really powerful group text,’ and I think that’s true,” Litman tells Glamour. “When a woman decides to run for office, a lot of people will tell her no. It makes it that much more important to have a friend in her corner who just looks at her and tells her, ‘I know this race. Yes.’”
Ahead of the midterm elections, Glamour spoke to 13 women about female friendship in politics. What follows are excerpts from our conversations.
Mikie Sherrill, Amy McGrath, and Elaine Luria
Sherrill, McGrath, and Luria—all graduates from the Naval Academy and now Democratic candidates for the U.S. House—are three in a wave of female veterans candidates on the ballot. In separate phone interviews over the summer, each quoted the Academy’s mission: to develop leaders for “the highest responsibilities of command, citizenship and government.”
Six of the women veterans on the ballot in November keep up via text thread, including Navy Academy alumnae Mikie Sherrill, Amy McGrath, and Elaine Luria.
Sherrill (NJ-11): I entered the race in May 2017, and I did not know that other women that went to the Naval Academy were running. When Amy announced, someone sent me a link to her video. Like, “Look! Another woman like you!” It just blew me away. We got in touch shortly thereafter.
Luria (VA-2): Amy and I were in the same class at the [Naval] Academy. Mikie was three years ahead of us. I didn’t know Mikie at the time, but now we realize that we have lots of friends in common because it’s not that big of a school and also, there were only about 100 women per class back then. Everyone knew who all the other women were. The first class of women started in 1976 and graduated in 1980, and there were 55 women. I graduated in 1997, as did Amy, and there were 115 of us in our class. (There were about 1,200 men.) We crossed paths a lot, but we didn’t know each other even as well then as we do now.
Amy decided to run last summer well before I had made the decision to do this, but in between, we had our 20th reunion at the Naval Academy. I was so proud of her—that she’d launched her campaign, and it was gaining a lot of traction. We had a little get-together with some other classmates, and she told us all about the race, the challenges, the path ahead that she saw. It was really encouraging.
I wrote to Amy before I made the announcement publicly. “I’m gonna do it!” She’s got young kids. I have a daughter who is nine, and we’re both in similar situations where our husbands have also served. That’s what we talked about the most. How are you doing this? How do you balance this?
McGrath (KY-6): I remember that. Elaine was still deciding, and I did not want to push her in either direction because it’s not a simple decision. I just wanted to be there for Elaine to tell her, “If you want to do this, I’m with you.”
We’re both in hard races, so we don’t have time to talk all the time, but I love that she’s out there. And Mikie was in this even before I was. It’s awesome to have a support network of female veterans. And it’s not just us. It’s Chrissy Houlahan. It’s Abigail Spanberger. Once, a bunch of us were passing through D.C. for an event, and we just sat down over a glass of wine. The release of tension—we can talk about the issues, what it’s like to be a veteran in politics, what it’s like to be a woman. We talk about all the people who come up to us and tell us, “I can’t vote for you because you’re the mother of small children.” It happens!
Recently, an ad came out against me that said, “Amy McGrath is a feminist!” This was what was used to attack me. When that aired, we all texted back and forth, like, “Is that the best he can do?”
Sherrill: If one of us wins a primary or gets an endorsement, there’s that text. But sometimes it’s phone calls about how to communicate with voters or how to reach people in our districts. We’re women—we know how to build consensus, work in coalition.
McGrath: Recently, an ad came out against me that said, “Amy McGrath is a feminist!” This was what was used to attack me. When that aired, we all texted back and forth, like, “Is that the best he can do?” It’s that kind of camaraderie, which we’re used to because women who’ve served do have to have a thick skin.
When I was a kid, I had this dream: I wanted to be a fighter pilot. I learned I couldn’t do that because there was a federal law prohibiting women from those roles. I got lucky in 1997. We had a new administration, with President Bill Clinton in his second term and a new Congress. Doors were now open for women in combat. Mikie, Elaine, and I arrived at the Naval Academy at a time when we could exit from there with all the doors open to us. When we started before we had those opportunities, there were men who believed that we had taken a seat from a man. We weren’t going to be able to serve like a man could serve, so we were sort of robbing the taxpayers of that investment. I think we look at this and go, “Nope. You got your investment out of us. We served, and we’re here. Now we’re running.”
Rep. Debbie Dingell and Rep. Barbara Comstock
Both Rep. Dingell (D-MI) and Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-VA) were elected to the House of Representatives in 2015.
“You can tell we’re really good friends,” Rep. Dingell explains, a moment before she has to leave Rep. Comstock on the line and go vote on a bill. “Because I just let her talk for me!”
PHOTO: NBC NewsWire
Rep. Debbie Dingell (L) and Rep. Barbara Comstock (R) in a joint appearance on Meet the Press in November 2017.
Rep. Comstock: Gosh, we met so long ago when I was still staff on the Hill and Debbie worked and her husband, of course, was a member. We really got to know each other well because both of us liked to have these bipartisan women’s lunches with people that we all knew in Washington. A late friend of ours used to say, “Washington isn’t Democrats vs. Republicans. It’s men vs. women.”
Once we were both elected in 2015, we found a lot of common ground on issues that do tend to affect women—breast cancer research and now sexual harassment.
Rep. Dingell: Barbara and I have been friends for decades, I think because we saw early in our careers that women needed to support each other. There weren’t many women back then, period. We were always two of a few women in the room. Neither Barbara nor I drop people! So we’ve kept up with each other all this time. We may not agree on all the issues but we do agree on supporting women and that friendship really matters.
“Washington isn’t Democrats vs. Republicans. It’s men vs. women.”
I’ll just add that when I was first elected, it was a really hard time for me. My husband [Rep. John Dingell, who represented Michigan in Congress for almost six decades] was in the hospital, and I was trying to adjust to a new job, take care of him, get everything in order, and Barbara knew what I was going through and checked in on me. I remember the afternoon she said, “You have to leave the hospital,” and we met at McClean Family Restaurant [in McClean, Virginia], and she said, “This is a mental health break.”
Rep. Comstock: We have tremendous mutual respect, and we share a worldview when it comes to values, when it comes to women at work. From the floors of factories to the boardrooms, we want to make sure that women’s voices are heard.
Jessica Ramos and Alessandra Biaggi
Both Democratic New York State Senate candidates, Ramos and Biaggi won their respective primaries, defeating entrenched (male) incumbents. Jeff Klein, whom Biaggi opposed, spent $3 million on the race. She won with 54 percent of the vote.
Alessandra Biaggi and Jessica Ramos met at a No IDC NY activist meet-up at the start of their respective bids for New York State Senate.
Ramos (District 13): I met Alessandra around nine months ago, or so. We were professional women who wanted to challenge these men in power whom we felt didn’t represent us at all. In New York, they’re called the Independent Democratic Conference, but they’re Democrats in name alone. They really vote like Republicans.
Biaggi (District 34): Because we were running against these candidates, it made sense to know each other. And then people started to endorse us as a pair, which was kind of great. I knew I think from the start that I could learn a lot from Jessica. She has experience in government, and she’s a mom, which I think is heroic. I’m engaged and I said to her, “I barely see my fiancé.” The fact that she has kids is remarkable. She’s shown me that as women, we don’t have to segment our lives to run our shelve our other responsibilities somewhere else. We incorporate our lives into these races, because our families and our friends and are our communities are the reason we’re in this.
Ramos: We can be each other’s cheerleaders, and not just because we’re both women, but because when it comes down to it, I don’t want to work with the incumbent. I want to work with Alessandra Biaggi. That’s who I want to pass laws with. That’s who I trust. I may not be able to vote for her because I live in another district. And I may not be able to contribute to her campaign because I haven’t seen a paycheck in months, which is part of running for office, but I am sure as hell her biggest cheerleader.
Biaggi: When I can’t sleep at night, I scroll through Twitter. Recently, I saw that Jessica’s opponent posted a video that was outrageous. The lies! It made me want to crack my phone in half. So I retweeted the video, and I said something like, “These are lies! Vote for Jessica!” I think I said, “Is this a joke?” I couldn’t believe it.
Ramos: That was hilarious, Alessandra. That is so representative. Alessandra is just like this. Sometimes, when I just can’t find it in me, I’m so tired, I’m so exhausted, I think about Alessandra. I do. I hear her, over my shoulder, like, “Go finish door-knocking in that building, Jessica. Go make 10 more calls.” She makes me better.
Ashley Selmon and Zahra Suratwala
Selmon and Suratwala are running for DuPage County Board in Illinois. “At times, I do feel discouraged,” Selmon says. “Like, when party leadership tells us we need to raise unfathomable amounts of money, and I’m looking at our account, and I’m like we’re not quite there! But I have Zahra, and we have this, and we have all these volunteers and all this enthusiasm. I think about that and I can’t help but believe what we want to achieve is possible.”
Ashley Selmon and Zahra Suratwala, candidates for the DuPage County Board, realized fast that collaboration could boost their chances at the ballot box.
Suratwala: We met after we both had decided to run back in September 2017, and we met because there are two seats on the board that will open in November, so we were introduced to each other. We text all the time, especially because campaign season is heating up and there are like 100 decisions to be made per second. Who can print yard signs? Who was that person who said she’d host a meet-and-greet for us? It’s just a constant stream of communication going on between us. But it’s wonderful because it means the work is divided in half. Whoever can take something on does, and as much as we ask each other to help out, we know we’re also both giving 100 percent.
Selmon: In a way, our friendship is a big part of our approach. Where we live, there’s one Democrat on this 18-seat board. If people don’t know the candidates on the ballot, in this area, they’ll just pick Republican. It makes sense to let voters know about both of us, have our faces and names together, so that voters are motivated to turn out for us. Zahra will never take credit for this, but after we won in the primary, I moved and had to have surgery. In any other timeline, I would have incredibly stressed about being out of pocket for a month in the middle of campaigning. But I knew Zahra would look at the emails and would text me if she needed me. She’s what I never could have expected when I decided to do this. And knowing what I know now, I never could have done it without her.
Liuba Grechen Shirley and Christine Pellegrino
Grechen Shirley is a progressive candidate for the U.S. House, who notably won a petition to the FEC that allowed her to spend campaign funds on childcare. Pellegrino beat a Republican in a deep red district in a special election in May 2017. She is now a member of the New York State Assembly.
“We take selfies all the time. At events, people come over and offer to take our photo, and we’re just like, ‘No, no, we’ll take a selfie,’” Grechen Shirley tells me. It was Pellegrino’s idea: “I wanted a record—we did this together.”
Christine Pellegrino, a member of the New York States Assembly, and Liuba Grechen Shirley, a candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives, made an instant connection over local politics and their (loud!) children.
Grechen Shirley (NY-2): After the presidential election in 2016, I started a grassroots Facebook group, and I called it New York 2nd District Democrats, and probably two days after this group went up, Christine reached out to me on Facebook and asked if we could talk. It was 11:00 p.m., I had a screaming six-month old infant to nurse, and Christine called me. We talked for an hour. She was one of the founding members of another activist group in the area, and we just delved into a plan to activate our people across the district. Her daughters were in the background; my child was sobbing. I knew in a second we’d be friends.
Pellegrino (District 9): This is what happens with women activists. We take up the call, literally.
Grechen Shirley: We put it all on the line because we’re fighting for change and we believe we can make a difference. But we have the same commitments that we did before. I’ve been at events with Christine where she’s had to run home to take her daughter to practice. Sometimes I have to rush out to get my daughter to dance class. It’s hard, but it would be harder alone.
Deb Haaland and Sharice Davids
Haaland and Davids (who, fun fact, is an ex-MMA fighter are both progressive candidates for the U.S. House and each could become the first Native American woman ever to serve in the chamber if she wins in November.
Sharice Davids (L) and Deb Haaland (R), campaigning together in Kansas in September 2018.
Davids (KS-3): Deb and I both went to the same summer program at the American Indian Law Center, a program that changed my life and enabled me to even be in a position to run for Congress. We weren’t the same class, but I felt connected to her because of that. Deb and I spoke soon after I announced I would run. The first time I called Deb, she was like, “If you need to sleep on my couch you can.” In some ways, I almost feel—Deb, you don’t even know this—that just hearing her on the other end in that first call, telling me, “Yes, do this,” was the validation I needed.
Haaland (NM-1): I had been at it for a lot longer than Sharice, at that point. It feels like a lifetime. A mutual contact put us in touch, and we share a lot of history. She was raised by a single mom. I’m a single mom. We’ve paid off our student loans. We’re both products of the public school system. We have a lot of similarities in our background, and when you share that struggle, it establishes a bond.
Davids: To me, Deb embodies that concept of someone who leads with love, who has genuine love and care for what we want to do here with Native candidates and women and the direction we’re headed in this nation. It’s been 240 years and we’ve never had a Native American woman in the House of Representatives in our government. It’s long overdue. I wish there were five of us and we all got sworn in at the same time. But we’ll take two for now, and we’ll leave the ladder down.
These conversations have been edited for clarity and concision.
Mattie Kahn is a senior editor at Glamour.
In a pivotal election year, Glamour is keeping track of the historic number of women running (and voting) in the midterm elections. For more on our latest midterm coverage, visit www.glamour.com/midterms.
If you’re an avid Instagram user, there’s a very good chance you’re one of the 142 million people who follow Selena Gomez. And if you’re among that group—comprising approximately 2 percent of the entire world’s population—there’s also a pretty good chance you double-tapped one of Gomez’s recent posts, which, in less than a week, has become her most-liked photo ever.
The post in question appeared late Saturday night (September 8). It’s a slideshow of two photos showing Gomez first posing with and then actually drinking a bright red cocktail. She wears a simple black strapless tube top and silver hoop earrings, and her long brown hair is slicked back into a high ponytail. As of press time, the captionless post had garnered nearly 10.7 million likes, thus securing the 13th spot on the list of most-liked IG posts, Harper’s Bazaar reports.
In doing so, the photos knock one of Gomez’s other posts down a peg. The previous record-holder for Gomez’s most-liked pic was a shot she posted almost exactly a year ago that showed her and close friend Francia Raísa holding hands across hospital beds. In the caption, Gomez explained she had undergone a kidney transplant and Raísa served as her donor. With just over 10.6 million likes, that sentimental shot now falls about 27,000 short of Gomez’s latest record-setting upload.
“I don’t have my password for Instagram. I have no apps on my phone, no photo editing apps. I have Peak, a brain game,” Gomez told ELLE for its October 2018 issue. “The reason why is, it’s not real to me. I know my voice is very prominent, but I’m not careless with it. I’m selective. As far as my personal life, someone sees me having a glass of wine? I could give two shits. I’m not trying to hide. That’s my life. I’m living it the way I want to live it. But it’s about making a conscious effort—if I can have a moment to be with my friends, I’ll take that time. So I don’t have any of it. I had to make that decision.”
Grey’s Anatomy has been around for a whopping 14 seasons, and honestly, there have been so many ups and downs and rollercoasters and heart-wrenching moments and steamy sexing sessions and just…emotions that it would take far too much time to recount the best of them here. Who even has the stamina for that kind of writing? Besides, it’s better look to the future than to the past—and as it turns out, the future means we can look forward to season 15 of Grey’s Anatomy Hallelujah, everyone.
ABC, the show’s home—and where it ranks No. 1 for primetime dramas among adults 18-49—announced on Friday that it would be renewing Shonda Rhimes’ famous hospital show for yet another season. That means, says ABC, that Grey’s is going to be ABC’s longest-running primetime drama series, and (here’s a watercooler fact) only seven TV dramas have ever run for longer. The current season, its 14th, is currently the most-watched in four years, so fans, the execs at ABC heard you. And they delivered.
The news isn’t exactly what you’d call a surprise: Grey’s is the series that keeps on giving to the audience and accountants alike, so whether it was going to be up for cancellation or not wasn’t up for debate. But any good news is good news in 2018—or whatever year it is on Grey’s—so we’re especially stoked about this.
We don’t yet know when it will begin filming, but you can bet we’ll keep you posted as we know more. In the meantime, at least Grey’s spin-off Station 19 is here to keep us company.
Typical Streep! Grande Dame of film acting Meryl Streep was just nominated for Best Actress for her role as Katharine Graham in Steven Spielberg’s The Post, a historical drama about The Washington Post battle against the Nixon administration to publish the Pentagon Papers. This is Streep’s 21st acting nomination, breaking her own record for most nominated actor ever. She’s well ahead of the game, since Jack Nicholson and Katharine Hepburn are tied for second place, with a measly 12 nominations apiece. While Streep is the most nominated actress in history, she isn’t actually the biggest winner; while she and a handful of others have three statuettes at home, Katharine Hepburn is the only person ever to take four for acting.
“I am honored beyond measure by this nomination for a film I love, a film that stands in defense of press freedom, and inclusion of women’s voices in the movement of history,” Streep said in a statement, per the Huffington Post following Tuesday’s nominations announcement. “Proud of the film, and all her filmmakers. Thank you from a full heart.”
The Post was also nominated for Best Picture, but the buzzy and timely drama failed to crack other categories. Still, there’s no denying that Streep is really good in it. Streep faces stiff competition for Best Actress, though. She’s up against Sally Hawkins (The Shape of Water), Frances McDormand (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), Margot Robbie (I, Tonya), and Saoirse Ronan (Lady Bird). McDormand is the clear favorite to win after this past weekend’s SAG Awards win.
But, undoubtedly, this latest nomination only further cements Streep as the greatest film actress of her time. She only very rarely makes a bad movie, and it’s never bad because of her. She can next be seen on the big screen in two highly anticipated musical sequels: Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again! and Mary Poppins Returns. Viva La Streep!
Late last week The Hollywood Reporter published a story about actresses battling the pay gap in Hollywood. In it they claimed (via an unnamed source from a Time’s Up meeting) that current Glamourcover star Tracee Ellis Ross was unhappy with the negotiations for the fifth season of Black-ish and had issues with her pay in comparison to costar Anthony Anderson. “Sources say Ellis Ross feels that if she isn’t brought up to Anderson’s level, she may opt to appear in fewer episodes to make up the disparity by guesting on another show.” The article also quoted a network source who said that Ross’s compensations would be significantly increased but that her role and Anderson’s were not comparable since he has been an executive producer since the show began.
Here’s the thing, according to Ross, nobody from THR reached out to her on the matter, and she says the comments attributed to her in the original article are not hers. So she took to Twitter to address the “conversation and speculation.” She says that she was in a common renegotiation during the fourth season of a “successful show” and that she “wanted to be compensated in a way that matches my contribution to a show that I love for many reasons, including the opportunity it allows me to be a fully realized black woman on TV.” She says that there were never any threats made about her role on the show.
And, of course, being the amazing woman and voice in the movement that she is, Ross takes a moment to talk about the larger societal issue at hand. “Having had my renegotiation become a public conversation was awkward, but I’m grateful for the outpouring of support. I’m truly thankful that important conversations are taking place about fighting for women’s worth and equality, tightening the pay gap in every industry.”
