Jennifer Palmieri, who served as Hillary Clinton’s communication director during the 2016 presidential election, got a front row seat to see the dejection that women felt when the candidate lost.
But looking back, Palmieri sees the defeat as a triggering moment.
“It might not have been a glass ceiling...but something sure shattered and women decided to react in a very powerful way,” she told Cheddar Monday.
Since President Trump was voted in, movements such as the Women’s March and #MeToo have taken hold and inspired change.
Palmieri isn’t giving up on the idea of a female president, perhaps even as soon as 2020.
But to get there, she says, there are two big hurdles female candidates will need to overcome.
The first is ambition.
“Where I think we still struggle is thinking about women and ambition,” she explained. “It was a question of, ‘Well, why does she want the job? What’s her motivation behind it?’ That’s different from the questions people have for male candidates.
“It’s the suspicion about motivations...that’s what was underneath comments that you would hear.”
The second is that they’re in uncharted territory.
“What I’m telling women now is...you are in a new universe...you have to understand you are charting a new path and there isn’t a manual here.”
Palmieri is the author of “Dear Madam President: An Open Letter to the Women Who Will Run the World.”
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/hillary-clintons-former-director-of-communications-on-the-democrats-she-thinks-can-beat-trump-in-2020).
The Taliban have vowed to respect women’s rights, forgive those who fought them and ensure Afghanistan does not become a haven for terrorists.
New Zealand’s government has taken drastic action by putting the entire nation into a strict lockdown after finding a single case of coronavirus infection in the community.
President Joe Biden says he stands “squarely behind” his decision for the U.S. to leave Afghanistan.
Stock indexes closed at record highs on Wall Street Monday, despite rising coronavirus infections in the U.S. and around the globe, as well as geopolitical concerns in Asia.
From Wall Street to Silicon Valley, these are the top stories that moved markets and had investors, business leaders, and entrepreneurs talking this week on Cheddar.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is facing a fresh hurdle to passing President Joe Biden’s multi-trillion dollar domestic policy aspirations.
Collapse of Afghanistan, Future of Fast Food & Britney Gets a Win
The U.S. is sending an additional 3,000 troops to Afghanistan to assist in the evacuation of some personnel from the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.
The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell for a third straight time last week, the latest sign that employers are laying off fewer people as they struggle to fill a record number of open jobs and meet a surge in consumer demand.
A controversial crypto provision, which would impose tax-reporting requirements on a broad cross-section of digital asset holders, slipped into the Senate infrastructure bill despite pushback from the industry's nascent lobbying arm.
