Collins: Where, oh where, will the first female president come from?

"Did you notice that when we went to the polls this month, voters in New Jersey and Virginia elected female candidates for governor? Big news! Come January, America will have women running 14 states, and they. Hey, wait a minute. We're going to celebrate the fact that this country has reached the historic moment when 28% of its governors are female? That's actually kind of depressing. No flood, only drizzle"

"I started my journalistic career in Connecticut covering Ella Grasso, who in 1974 became the first woman not succeeding her husband ever elected governor in the United States. She was nationally known for her motherly demeanor in public, and I always cherished the story about a minor bill she opposed that contrasted with that image. The bill, to allow bow-and-arrow hunting on Sundays, somehow passed,"

Voters in New Jersey and Virginia elected female governors, bringing women to govern 14 states and constituting 28% of U.S. governors. The increase represents modest advancement rather than a sweeping transformation in female gubernatorial representation. Ella Grasso became the first woman elected governor not succeeding her husband in 1974 and was known for a motherly public persona; a notable anecdote involved her opposing a bill to allow bow-and-arrow hunting on Sundays. In New Jersey, Mikie Sherrill defeated Jack Ciattarelli 57% to 43%. In Virginia, Abigail Spanberger won the governorship while Winsome Earle-Sears became the state's first female lieutenant governor and first Black woman elected to state office, amid campaign challenges linked to the national political climate.

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