Who run for office? Girls.

How Trump's presidency is inspiring women to enter politics

Female members of Congress.
(Image credit: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images)

That smug, can't-catch-me grin. Those wee flailing hands, attempting to punctuate facts that don't exist. That whiny voice huffing, "The biggest. Ever. Believe me." I've long thought it true, but now statistics prove it: There's something about Donald Trump standing at the presidential podium that makes women want to run.

They're not running away from politics, though; they're sprinting towards it — in vast, pissed-off, let's-do-this numbers. Attendance was 66 percent higher than usual at Rutgers University's Center for American Women and Politics "Ready to Run" workshop in March, an event for women interested in seeking office. People were even being turned away. Last year, EMILY's List, a group that helps pro-choice Democratic women get elected, talked to 900 women who wanted to run during the 2016 election cycle; this year they've heard from 11,000.

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Starshine Roshell

Starshine Roshell is a veteran journalist and award-winning columnist whose work has appeared in The Hollywood Reporter, New York Post and Westways magazine. She is the author of Keep Your Skirt On, Wife on the Edge and Broad Assumptions.