Many Democratic women in Congress donned bright pink during President Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, using the color as a symbol of defiance against his administration.
Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández of New Mexico, chair of the Democratic Women’s Caucus, told Time magazine that the demonstration was meant to protest Trump’s policies, which she claimed negatively impact women and families. She described pink as a “color of power and protest” and vowed that opposition to Trump would be “loud and clear.”
“He costs us too much in terms of money, health, lives and safety,” she said. “From cradle to old age, this man and the Republican agenda is devastating for America’s women. We want the world to know we stand in protest, we stand in power. We stand in pink and we stand in opposition.”
Prior to the address, the 96-member caucus gathered outside the U.S. Capitol, where Leger Fernández declared, “Women cannot afford Trump.”
This isn’t the first time Democratic congresswomen have used clothing as a political statement. In 2017, they wore white during Trump’s first address to highlight women’s rights, and last year, they wore white again during President Biden’s State of the Union to emphasize reproductive rights.
In a 2024 statement, the caucus reinforced their commitment to abortion access, birth control, and IVF, asserting that “women, not politicians, should be in charge of whether, when, and how to start or grow their families.”
In August 2021, a group of Democrat women political strategists gathered for a dinner in Washington, DC, to discuss Vice President Kamala Harris’s media “crisis,” according to a report.
Axios reports that former adviser to both Bill and Hillary Clinton, Kiki McLean, hosted the dinner with former DNC officials Donna Brazile and Leah Daughtry; former Barack Obama spokesperson and Joe Biden adviser Stephanie Cutter; former Hillary Clinton spokeswomen and Democratic strategists Adrienne Elrod and Karen Finney; and former Obama communications director Jennifer Palmieri, who also worked for Hillary Clinton’s second failed presidential campaign.
No one from Harris’ office was present for the dinner but “Harris confidant Minyon Moore” attended, according to the report.
The group discussed best practices for fighting back against negative perceptions of Harris, as she has suffered a series of political setbacks in the first six months of the Biden presidency.
