00:09After the 2016 election, I couldn't take it anymore.
00:12Our representatives have no idea how the policies that they enact actually affect our lives.
00:18Everybody kept asking, why don't you run?
00:20And I thought, I have two babies.
00:23I didn't think I could actually manage it.
00:25But we need somebody to stand up for working Americans.
00:28A record number of women are running for office.
00:30The year of the woman.
00:31Female nominees.
00:32Now more than ever before.
00:34Pink wave.
00:34Coming to Congress.
00:35Turn the energy of protest into actual power.
00:42I loved growing up on Long Island.
00:44My favorite childhood memories are being at the beach with my family.
00:48I'm raising my kids in the home that my grandparents bought nearly 80 years ago.
00:53I love that it's the home that my mom grew up in.
00:55It's the home that I grew up in and now my children are growing up here.
00:59My grandparents were immigrants.
01:00They were political refugees.
01:02My grandmother's father was told by the Bolsheviks that if he was still working for the provisional government,
01:07they would hang him from the tree in his front yard in the morning.
01:10And they left in the middle of the night.
01:12They came through Ellis Island and they built a very strong life for themselves.
01:16They moved out here on Long Island and they had the opportunity to build their American dream.
01:21My grandparents instilled that it's important to make sure that you're working hard,
01:26taking care of your family, taking care of other people.
01:29We need somebody who will fight for common sense solutions.
01:32And I kept waiting for the right person to come along and run for office.
01:36And in the end, I realized I was that person.
01:42I am running for Congress, the New York 2nd District against Peter King.
01:45And I just wanted to give him an update on the race.
01:48Hi, my name is Lupa Gretchen Shirley.
01:50Hi, Tim. It's Lupa. I hope all is well.
01:52My first name is Lupa.
01:53My first name is Lupa, L-I-U-B-A.
01:56And the last is Gretchen Shirley.
01:57I have a couple of things I wanted to catch you up on.
01:59And I'll talk to you soon.
02:00Thanks so much. Bye.
02:02When I got pregnant, I realized that I was one of 88% of American women
02:06who did not have access to paid family leave.
02:08I was finishing my MBA.
02:10I was working full time.
02:12And one in four American women will go back to work 10 days after giving birth.
02:15And that is a public health crisis.
02:18It is a human rights crisis.
02:19So I needed to do something more.
02:22I created New York 2nd District Democrats.
02:24I'd be up in the morning nursing my son.
02:26And I'd write an action alert every morning at 9 a.m.
02:28We're having a lobby day.
02:30We're having a protest.
02:30This is the issue we're going to talk about.
02:32And the group grew to about 3,000 people pretty quickly.
02:36For the first six months of this campaign, I did not have a babysitter.
02:40We're going to tidy up your road. You're going to help me?
02:43Yeah.
02:44It was hectic.
02:45I would be nursing my son and on a phone.
02:48And my daughter would be putting a million clips in my hair.
02:50And I'd be calling donors.
02:56Hi, are you Crescentia?
02:59I'm Lupa, Gretchen Shirley.
03:00I'm running for Congress.
03:02So on November 6th, come out and vote.
03:03You vote? Okay.
03:05I want to be the most accessible representative that our district has ever seen.
03:14I just wanted to stop in and interrupt your haircuts.
03:17And I wanted to hear what issues are most important to you.
03:19There's a lot of injustice going on in the black community.
03:22I agree with you.
03:23It's another one of the many reasons I'm running.
03:26It needs to be a conversation that we're actually having.
03:28We need justice.
03:29We need to hold those who commit crimes accountable.
03:31We need to actually build a better relationship between the police and our black communities.
03:35Having a presence in the community further serves the fight to make sure that we are informed so that our
03:42vote is in the right hands.
03:46We realized that if we were going to continue to build this campaign, that we really needed help.
03:51So we put in a request to be able to use some of the funds that I'm raising for my
03:55campaign on childcare.
03:57We are here today in Washington, D.C., outside of the FEC.
04:00We're about to go in where I'm going to testify, and I'm really excited.
04:04This is a big moment for our campaign.
04:06To my surprise, it became this huge thing.
04:10In a landmark decision, some of those candidates might be able to get some additional help.
04:15Getting more women in Congress means getting real about what a woman running for office needs.
04:19Hillary Clinton wrote a three-page letter in support.
04:2224 representatives wrote in in support.
04:24And the FEC unanimously approved it.
04:27We change the way that people will run for office.
04:32A lot of people forget that politics is personal.
04:35It's about your life.
04:37So many people who have never thought they were going to run for office this year needed to step up
04:42and fight back.
04:43And that's the wave that I'm proud to be part of.
