Welcome to the Media Round Up! We’ve collected and shared our favorite gender + politics stories from this week. Is there a story we should know about? Tell us at: ongender@gmail.com

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Briefing: What’s Ahead for Women on Election Day 2026
Center for American Women & Politics, Daniel De Simone

Primary elections are complete for the 2026 election cycle, and the Center for American Women & Politics  (CAWP) at Rutgers University has compiled a Briefing on the results. CAWP will conduct a virtual Briefing on October 6th, plus you can preview the data here. There are some new records: the number of women on the ballot for governor, and the number of women nominees for state legislatures for example. A detailed Post-Primary Analysis: Women in 2026 Congressional Elections by Kelly Dittmar, PhD. is available here.

Morocco Appoints First Woman Prime Minister

On Tuesday, King Mohammed VI named Fatima Zahra El Mansouri Morocco’s first female prime minister after the Authenticity and Modernity Party (PAM) won the most seats in the parliamentary elections. El Mansouri was chosen over the country’s football chief, Fouzi Lekjaa, a top politician from the same centrist party. While El Mansouri has not often spoken publicly about women’s rights or gender inequality, she has been a prominent politician. She previously served as a minister in a coalition government and has recently served as mayor of Marrakesh for several years. While PAM did not win a majority in Morocco’s parliament, the king’s appointment will task El Mansouri with forming the new government.

As the UN Ponders its Next Secretary-General, Many Say it’s Well Past Time for a Woman to Lead
Associated Press, Edith M. Lederer

Despite global campaigns championing gender equality, the United Nations has yet to elect a female Secretary-General in its more than 80-year history. As the General Assembly convened in New York this week to begin deliberating candidates for the impending position vacancy, international advocacy groups are intensifying the pressure to finally shatter what many deem to be the UN’s highest glass ceiling. With a recent UN Women’s “gender snapshot” projecting an estimate of taking another 171 years to achieve global gender equality, both activists and diplomats alike argue that appointing a woman is no longer a symbolic gesture, but a necessary mandate for the institution’s overall global credibility. Advocates, such as the UN Women Deputy Executive Director Sarah Hendriks warned that the UN cannot effectively pressure governments and corporations into breaking down barriers for women’s leadership goals, while simultaneously continuing to leave its own glass ceilings intact.

Personal Stories on The Ballot This Fall

As the 2026 midterms approach, women across the country are bringing personal experiences and local concerns to the campaign trail. In New Mexico, Deb Haaland is running for governor and openly discussing her past struggles with addiction, including a drinking problem in high school, two arrests, and her journey to sobriety in her 20s. Rather than hiding her past, Haaland is making it a central part of her campaign, hoping to connect with New Mexicans affected by addiction and the fentanyl crisis.

In Los Angeles, city councilmember Nithya Raman is taking a different approach to connecting with voters. As she challenges Mayor Karen Bass, Raman has emphasized her independence from the Democratic Socialists of America and defended her appearance with progressive commentator Hasan Piker to reach voters across the political spectrum. Her campaign has focused on homelessness and anti-Semitism, while Bass has faced criticism surrounding her response to the devastating Palisades Fire.

In Alaska, former congresswoman Mary Peltola is also attempting to build a broad coalition of voters as she runs for Senate. A member of the Yup’ik tribe, Peltola has built her political career around issues that reflect the complexity of Alaska itself, supporting gun rights, oil and gas development, environmental protection, and the fishing industry. Her path to national politics has not been easy, as she has had to navigate the deaths of her mother and husband and a difficult 2024 reelection campaign. While these three candidates are very different in nature, they are all connecting their personal experiences with their broader communities.

‘We Cannot Ignore the Elephant in the Room’: Ken Paxton’s Estranged Wife Speaks to GOP Women
CNN, Patrick Svitek

On Monday, Angela Paxton – who is currently divorcing Texas GOP Senate nominee Ken Paxton – posted a video urging Republican women to support conservative candidates in Texas in the upcoming midterm elections. Angela Paxton, a Texas state senator herself, did not reference her husband or his contentious race against Democrat James Talarico. In the speech, titled “The Elephant in the Room,” Paxton instead made multiple references to Texas Republicans feeling conflicted about how to vote this fall. “The reality is, while we are the party of values, we have some vulnerabilities on our ballot, some real vulnerabilities,” Paxton offered. “And I’ll be honest with you, I think Republican women will decide this election, because some of those vulnerabilities, I think, have been particularly alienating to women that hold our values.”

Failed Execution Attempt Prompts Tennessee Governor to Indefinitely Postpone the First Execution of a Woman in 200 Years

Christina Pike, who was sentenced to death in 1995, appears to have survived a botched execution attempt despite 2 doses of pentobarbital, the lethal drug, being administered. Pike was set to be Tennessee’s first woman executed in 200 years. She could be heard snoring loudly in the execution chamber Wednesday night more than an hour after the execution process began and nearly 30 minutes after a second, backup dose of pentobarbital was administered. The Tennessee department of ​correction later confirmed in a statement that Pike had survived the state’s effort to execute her, and Tennessee governor, Bill Lee, who denied Pike’s clemency petition on Monday, issued a ‌statement suspending all executions this year and calling for a “comprehensive, third-party review” of the latest attempt. This is a developing story.

A State and Federal Tug-of-War Title

The landscape of gender and sex discrimination protections is rapidly shifting as a growing divide emerges between federal mandates and state-level defiance. This week, federal officials began revising Biden-era Title IX rules, a choice that forces the national government to fundamentally reshape how it approaches issues of sex discrimination. However, state leaders are preparing their own legislative counter-offensives. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom pushed back against the ongoing federal momentum by signing a comprehensive package of bills aimed at safeguarding LGBTQ+ and reproductive rights. The new legislation explicitly limits the out-of-state sharing of sexual orientation and gender identity data, while increasing access to medication abortion on community college campuses amid national rollbacks.

Meanwhile, beyond just statehouses, this tug-of-war is playing out in the courts and collegiate sports. The debate over how discrimination protections apply to athletics shifted this week when a federal judge tossed out a high-profile lawsuit seeking to overturn the NCAA’s transgender athlete policy, ruling that the association itself is not subject to Title IX requirements. As these federal, state, and judicial policies pull in different directions, the national framework for LGBTQ+ and women’s rights continues to fragment. With the rules now largely depending on where a person lives or plays, these localized battles will continue to shape the political and policy conversation.

Cornell University Didn’t Just Fail One Woman. It Failed Everyone Watching.
ELLE, Rita Omokha

Earlier this month, former Cornell student “Jane Doe” filed a lawsuit in the Manhattan Supreme Court, alleging that seven Chi Phi fraternity brothers sexually assaulted her over the course of seven hours in October of 2024. Doe’s lawsuit targets the university, her own sorority, the Chi Phi fraternity, and the seven individual men she accused. Many have expressed outrage at the lack of criminal charges and resulting “punishments” that ensued. The district attorney, citing evidence obtained from Cornell’s own internal investigation, did not press criminal charges; only two of the seven men were expelled from the university, and the others were offered the chance to write essays to apologize for their conduct. ELLE explores why Cornell not only failed Jane Doe, but everyone watching – “We must collectively call bullshit on this system that has found it is acceptable to savagely hurt women and say, ‘Well, men can’t control themselves and their perversion, so let’s all just be understanding.”

As Pro Women’s Sports Boom, Study Finds Red Flags in Pipeline
USA Today, Callie Fin

On Wednesday, the Women’s Sports Foundation released its inaugural Sport Report, which found that women still face significant barriers in professional women’s sports. The annual assessment examined women and girls’ sports at every level (youth sports, college, professional, Olympic and Paralympic) based on surveys of over 6,100 parents and children, and 60 women’s sports professionals. The report concluded that while women’s professional sports continue to see “unprecedented growth and visibility,” many girls are burdened by the high cost of entry into sports, a lack of awareness of their Title IX-protected rights, and a declining sense of belonging. Nearly half of girls could not name a favorite professional female athlete, while only two percent of boys identified a woman athlete as their favorite.

False Birth Control Claims are Proliferating, Survey Says
Stateline, Sofia Resnick

A new survey by the health research organization KFF shows that one in three women between the ages of 18 and 49 have seen or heard misinformation surrounding birth control. These claims cast doubt on hormonal birth control and emergency contraceptive pills in favor of ‘natural family planning prevention’ methods. However, the American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists shows that long-acting reversible contraception and hormonal birth control are much more effective at preventing pregnancy than fertility awareness-based methods such as menstrual cycle tracking. While over 85% of reproductive-aged women receive and trust healthcare information, only 26% said they trust U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Alternatively, about 25% of surveyed women trust AI tools and chatbots, and 14% said they trust social media and social media influencers.