Thirty-five percent of Joe Biden’s full-time staff are people of color, a Biden campaign aide told CNN, while 36% of senior staff were people of color. Both senior staff and full-time staff are majority women, with 53% of full-time staff and 58% of senior staff identified as women. Five percent of staff chose not to specify, the aide told CNN.
The newly revealed data do not show full staff damage based on race and ethnicity.
President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign released a number of them Saturday night.
Of the full-time campaign staff, 52% were women, while senior staff consisted of 56% women and 25% people of color, a spokesman told CNN Donald Judd. Damage to people of color among full-time staff is not available, the spokesman said.
Alida Garcia, one of the founders of Inclusv, a diversity in political groups, told CNN before the Trump campaign released figures that the company was “excited” to see the Biden campaign “reach the first major step towards transparency around their team structure,” but showed that there is “clearly room for growth.”
“We have optimism that they will be able to maybe even beat the numbers where Hillary Clinton ended up in her campaign,” Garcia said.
Per assistant, senior staff including department heads, senior advisers, deputy campaign managers, and senior consultants who spend most of their time on campaigns, and so on. The helper noted that the campaign is still continuing the recruitment process and hopes to continue to add key leaders throughout the campaign.
The release of data came after Biden emphasized the diversity of his top staff during the town hall focusing on issues affecting Asian American and Pacific Islanders and amid growing national conversation about racial justice and inclusion.
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Biden confirmed to the questioners that it was and directed his staff to release diversity data after the event.
“We will release diversity data today when we come out of this call. We will contact you, and the fact is we have a very diverse staff. And we have a diverse staff that is on the entire board, above senior levels and positions,” said Biden.
Garcia told CNN that Inclusv had been working with the Biden campaign for months to build a diverse team and previewed that they would work together in the coming weeks to hold seminars and events for people of color who were interested in being involved in the campaign.
Pointing to the lack of specificity in the data released, Garcia said, “Giving each community a better understanding of their position in the organization is very important for organizations to conduct self-reflection to ensure that they are building a team in stating that reflecting voters from the state but for outside entities to judge how many seats at the table they have. “
“At the very least, we believe that a democratic campaign must reflect voters who determine the part of their votes for the path to victory,” Garcia said.
Biden often touted the diversity of his team on the campaign track, telling voters who questioned how he would become an inclusive president, “look at my staff.” He also has long promised that he will have a diverse government that is “like America,” although his campaign will not currently provide mixed data to BuzzFeed News when asked.
Responding to specific questions Biden was asked on Saturday about representatives of Asia America and the Pacific Islands during the town hall, the campaign noted that senior AAPI leaders in the campaign included the chief of campaign finance, chief of operations, director of national voter protection, chief of digital staff, director of digital partnerships and director a substitute.
This story has been updated to include diversity figures from the Trump campaign.
CORRECTION: This story has been updated to improve Inclusv’s spelling.