Wednesday, September 12, 2018

Report: Nearly Three Quarters of the House Have No Senior Staffers of Color

Almost three-quarters of House members —313 in all —have no top staffers of color, according to a report from the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies released on Tuesday.

“Top staff” refers to top staff chiefs of staff, legislative directors, and communications directors in D.C. personal offices, chiefs of staff, policy directors and communications directors in the top four leadership offices of each party and staff directors assigned to full committees.

Just under 14 percent of all top House staff are people of color, according to the report, “Racial Diversity Among Top U.S. House Staff,” which relied on data that reflected the demographic makeup of staffers as of June 1. At that time, people of color accounted for 38 percent of the U.S. population.

A total of 329 House members are white. “Chiefs of staff of color” led the personal offices of only 16 of those, the report stated. Ten worked in Republican offices and six in Democratic offices.

For all top staff in offices of white Democratic members, the report found that less than 8 percent are people of color. For white Republican members, 3 percent of top staffers are people of color.

Among the report’s other findings:


No Latino, Asian American/Pacific Islander, or Native American is a staff director for any of the 40 committee staff director positions in the House.

No Latino, Asian American/Pacific Islander, or Native Americans holds any of the 24 top staff positions in the four leadership offices in the House.

Latinos make up less than 28 percent of Democratic Congressional Hispanic Caucus Members’ offices.

Latinos make up over 29 percent of Republican Congressional Hispanic Conference members’ offices.

Of the top staffers who are black, almost 61 percent are women.

Of the top Latino staffers, almost 45 percent are women.

Of the top Asian American/Pacific Islander, over 31 percent are women.

In the offices of members who are Asian American/Pacific Islander, over 77 percent of staffers are white.

Read more: Report: Nearly Three Quarters of the House Have No Senior Staffers of Color

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