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Sexism, racism drive black women to run for office in both Brazil and US

Motivated in part by President Donald Trump's and the , American women are . At least are on the ballot as major party congressional candidates in the November general election.

The surge includes a record number of women of color, many of whom say their candidacies reflect a personal concern about America's . In addition to the 59 black female congressional candidates, Georgia's Stacey Abrams hopes to become her state's first black governor.

The U.S. is not the only place where the advance of racism and misogyny in politics has has spurred black women to .

In Brazil, a record 1,237 black women will be .

Brazilian women rise up

I'm a , so I have been closely watching Brazil's 2018 campaign season – which has been marked by controversy around race and gender – for parallels with the United States.

Last weekend, against the far-right presidential frontrunner Jair Bolsonaro, under the banner of – #NotHim.

Bolsonaro, a pro-gun, anti-abortion congressman with strong evangelical backing, once that she "didn't deserve to be raped" because she was "terrible and ugly."

Bolsonaro has seen a boost in the polls since he was at a campaign rally on Sept. 8 in a politically motivated attack.

Brazil has shifted rightward since 2016, when the left-leaning female president Dilma Rousseff was ousted in a partisan impeachment process that .

Her successor, then-Vice President Michel Temer, quickly passed an austerity budget that enacted under Rousseff and her predecessor, Workers Party founder Luís Inácio "Lula" da Silva.

The move decimated funding for agencies and laws that protect women, people of color and the .

Racism in Brazil

In Brazil, these three categories – women, people of color and the very poor – tend to overlap.

Brazil, which has more people of African descent than most African nations, was the largest slaveholding society in the Americas. Over 4 million enslaved Africans between 1530 and 1888.

Brazil's political, social and economic dynamics still reflect this history.

Though Brazil has long , black and indigenous Brazilians are than their white compatriots. Black women also experience at much higher rates than white women – a that dates back to slavery.

Afro-Brazilians – who make up just over half of Brazil's 200 million people, according to the 2010 census – are also , though sources disagree on exactly how few black Brazilians hold public office.

serve in the Senate, including . In the 513-member lower Chamber of Deputies, about 20 percent . of hold around .

Black women step into the fray

That could change on Sunday.

This year, 9,204 of the 27,208 people running for office across Brazil are women, which reflects a law requiring political parties to . About 13 percent of female candidates in 2018 are .

In most Brazilian states, that's a marked increase over Brazil's , in 2014, according to the online publication .

In São Paulo, Brazil's most populous state, 105 black women ran for office in 2014. This year, 166 are. In Bahia state, there are 106 black female candidates for political office, versus 59 in 2014. The number has likewise doubled in Minas Gerais, from 51 in 2014 to 105 this year.

As in the United States, Brazil's black wave may be a direct response to alarming social trends, including sharp rises in gang violence and police brutality, both of which disproportionately affect black communities.

But many female candidates in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil's second largest city, say one specific event .

In March, Marielle Franco, an Afro-Brazilian human rights activist and Rio de Janeiro city councilwoman, was assassinated – the since November 2017.

Franco's murder remains unsolved, but she was an outspoken critic of the military occupation of Rio's poor, mostly black favela neighborhoods. The ongoing police investigation , which also killed her driver.

Her death unleashed an avalanche of in Rio de Janeiro, with new groups offering fundraising and political training for female candidates of color.

On Sunday, 231 black women from Rio de Janeiro state will stand for election in local, state and federal races – and more than double the number who ran in 2014.

Black representation from Rio to Atlanta

Black women may have been historically excluded from Brazil's formal political arena, but they have been since the country's in 1985.

Decades before #MeToo, Brazilian women of color were on the front lines of activism around issues like gender-based violence, sexual harassment and abortion.

Brazil has hundreds of black women's groups. Some, including , a center for public policy, of the Brazilian human rights movement. The founder of the Rio de Janeiro anti-racism group , Jurema Werneck, is now the director of Amnesty International in Brazil.

The fact that thousands of black women, both veteran activists and political newcomers, will appear on the ballot on Sunday is testament to their efforts.

As in the United States, black Brazilian women's demand for political representation is deeply personal. They have watched as their mostly male and conservative-dominated congresses chipped away at hard-won protections for and in recent years, exposing the fragility of previous decades' progress on race and gender.

Black women in Brazil and the U.S. know that full democracy hinges on full participation. By entering into politics, they hope to foster more inclusive and equitable societies for all.