Every weekday, Myya Jones works from 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. as an executive assistant at General Electric in downtown Detroit. On the weekends, she knocks on doors, meeting voters in her quest to become the youngest woman state representative in Michigan’s history.
Jones has no campaign staff, just a group of mostly college-aged volunteers who help run her operation.
“Everything else is me,” she said in a recent conversation with ThinkProgress.
Jones, who graduated from Michigan State last year, ran for Detroit Mayor while still in college and threw her hat in the ring again this year. She’s running in Michigan’s fourth district. It’s a crowded primary with 13 other people on the ballot, but the district is solidly blue, and whoever wins the primary, which is slated for August 7, is expected to win the general election by a landslide.
Jones is hardly your traditional political candidate: she’s 23 years old and recently debuted a campaign ad, shot like a music video, that features Jones rapping an original song called “Run Me My Vote.”
BC regular campaign vids are BORING! Help us reach our fundraising goal & get me elected as the youngest woman ever in MI’s State legislature. https://t.co/btMxhg1Wdx#RunMyyasVote#TheYearOfTheWoman #BlackWomenLead #TrustBlackWomen #RepresentationMatters #TheChisholmEffect pic.twitter.com/VVpmEhe0Zp
— Myya D. Jones (@MyyaJones) July 12, 2018
In response to the “very few trolls” complaining about the video, Jones shared a Cardi B meme on Twitter.
To the very few trolls: every 20 houses you knock, you get one negative comment. Just click the link to sign up. Ready, set, GO! 🤗https://t.co/zbxNh41gCX
#3WeekCountDown #Myya4StateRep pic.twitter.com/1yy39UaCUf
— Myya D. Jones (@MyyaJones) July 16, 2018
While Jones’ age and campaign style set her apart from rest of the field, many of the challenges she has faced during her campaign are hardly unique, particularly for young women of color running for office. One enormous issue with which Jones has become all too familiar is the fundraising paradox.
In order to get the backing of big groups like EMILY’s List or other establishment groups that help Democrats fundraise, candidates must prove they have a viable path to victory. But how can you prove a viable path to victory without money?
Ultimately, in order to secure that backing, candidates either need to be independently wealthy and willing to pour money into their campaigns or have existing fundraising networks that can help them raise big money early. That in itself can be difficult to establish.
“I’ll go around and meet people [and ask for donations] and they’ll say, ‘Let’s see how much money you raise,'” Jones said. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
The only way to break that cycle, she said, is for organizations like EMILY’s List (which stands for “Early Money Is Like Yeast,” because it “brings in the dough”) to back candidates like herself.
Jones said she reached out to EMILY’s List. She never heard back. ThinkProgress also reached out to EMILY’s List for this story. A spokesperson twice scheduled a phone interview and twice never called.
So Jones is stuck, waiting for everyone else to stop waiting for someone else to make the first move. In the meantime, she has looked to her peers for support.
“I have a lot of small donors who are mostly college kids,” she told ThinkProgress. “[And] I’ve had a lot of people willing to give their time to me… regardless of whether I have establishment support or union dollars.”
Jones’s struggle is particularly salient considering one of the issues most important to her as a candidate: proving the viability of Black woman candidates. Black women are consistently among the most reliable voters for the Democratic party, but, as Jones said, “You don’t see many of us at all in politics.”
In February, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) released its list of “Red to Blue” candidates, a list of two dozen candidates they believe are most likely to flip House seats currently held by Republicans. The list did not include a single Black candidate.
After complaints, the DCCC added two, Lauren Underwood, who’s running in Illinois, and Colin Allred, who’s running in Texas.
Pam Keith, a Black woman, attorney, and former U.S. Naval officer who’s running in Florida for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, told USA Today that the DCCC actually hurt her campaign by putting her opponent on the Red to Blue list ahead of the Florida primary.
“It’s not just a lack of support. It’s a head-to-head battle and they put a rocket on my opponent’s back,’’ Keith said. “When it comes to people like me they’re like, ‘You’re on your own. Prove to us that you can fundraise, and if you don’t satisfy them then they say, ‘Oh well, I guess you’re not that strong of a candidate and we’re going to push you out.’ But they will go over the moon to help another type of candidate.’’
And in New Jersey, the DCCC supported state Sen. Jeff Van Drew in a House race despite his votes against same sex marriage and history of donations from the National Rifle Association (NRA). His opponent, Tanzie Youngblood, told Newsweek the DCCC doesn’t “see the value in a candidate like [her].”
Changing that perception is central to Jones’ campaign.
“People should be able to respect us and support our candidacy,” she told ThinkProgress. “People need to support Black women candidates…. Support us with your votes, support us with your time.”
Recently, Jones traveled to Washington, D.C. for a panel about the #MeToo movement and women running for state office. With her on the panel was Anna Eskamani, who’s running for the Florida House. If elected, Eskamani would be the first Iranian-American ever to serve in the chamber. As of Wednesday, she had raised a jaw-dropping $320,000.
Speaking with ThinkProgress, Eskamani recalled the day she announced her campaign last summer. It was July 2017, and within 24 hours of her announcement, she had raised $12,000 — more in a single day than Jones has raised for her entire campaign. Eskamani, like Jones, works full time. At 28, she is also considered a young candidate.
But Eskamani’s experience in the nonprofit world, first with Planned Parenthood and now with another nonprofit in Florida, makes her an adept fundraiser.
“Perhaps for me what makes it very unique is that I have this long track record,” she said, adding that she thinks part of her success is how unabashed she is about asking for money.
When someone messages her on instagram asking for a yard sign, Eskamani asks if they can donate $10, too. When she calls big Democratic party donors, she said she’ll ask for $100 if they don’t want to give bigger money.
It’s the small donations that mean the most. Thanks for believing in us, and for being a part of our movement. #HD47 #Flip47 #OnwardWithAnna #sayfie #flapol pic.twitter.com/NcU4bVym4q
— Anna For Florida (@AnnaForFlorida) July 31, 2018
Her early success put her on the national radar. She secured an EMILY’s List endorsement, and she’s been included in fundraising email blasts supporting her campaign from Ruth’s List, a Florida group build in the image of EMILY’s List, as well as from Bold Progressives, the National Iranian American Council, and the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC).
Eskamani’s ability to rake in donations has meant that other women running for office have looked to Eskamani for advice. She said she encourages them to make small asks and to try and overcome the ingrained sense that many women have asking for money.
“For many women in general, this society tells women not to take up a lot of space and if you’re a woman of color that’s even more grounded in you,” she said. “Asking for a gift is something that many women struggle with. We’re taught not to be loud, only be caretakers… when you’re running for office, you have to intentionally challenge that.”
Asked if she believed campaign finance reform could help women running for office, Eskamani paused.
“Potentially,” she said, adding that she’s a full supporter of campaign finance reform that would limit how much you can spend. For now, though, the game is the game and she wants to help women play it.
She added, “It’s kind of unbelievable that I have to spend this much to even be competitive.”
The first thing Eskamani did when deciding to run for office was write her concession speech, she told ThinkProgress. “I wanted to accept that as a reality… [and] to be able to paint the picture of what the victories were even if we lost,” she said.
She says now that she doesn’t think she’s going to need it.
Jones, in her competitive primary and with nothing close to the kind of money Eskamani has raised, isn’t quite as confident — yet. After sitting on the panel with Eskamani last month, she said she was shocked to hear Eskamani had raised more than $300,000.
“I wish I could have said I raised $10,000,” she told ThinkProgress later.
But Jones says she isn’t going anywhere and that she doesn’t let the idea of losing bother her.
“I’m 23 years old… Losing is not a really big deal for me,” she said. “I have a long life ahead of me.”
UPDATE, 12:00 p.m. Friday: EMILY’s List reached out to ThinkProgress with a comment following the publication of this story.
“This cycle we have heard from over 40,000 women interested in running for office, including many women of color,” Vanessa Cárdenas, EMILY’s List senior director of national outreach, said in an email. “We have also trained and endorsed some of the most exciting candidates this cycle including Gina Ortiz Jones, Lauren Underwood, Veronica Escobar, Sharice Davids and Stacey Abrams to name a few. We recognize that raising money is a challenge for many which is why a key piece of our training and our candidates services is helping candidates become effective fundraisers.”