How a Blue Wave Could Crash Far Beyond Washington

One of the first things that Anna Eskamani did when she decided to run for the Florida state House of Representatives was write her concession speech.

It was a way of grappling with her own hesitation about becoming a candidate. Upset by the results of the 2016 election, Eskamani was convinced that more women needed to run for office, but she didn’t think that was her calling: She was an organizer and operative, not a politician.

“I did what a lot of women do and I encouraged all my friends to run,” Eskamani says. “I literally went to girlfriends, and I was like, ‘You need to run, what can I do? I’ll help you.’ They would look back at me and say, ‘Why don’t you do it?’”

But she hesitated. Although she had a long background in politics, from campaign work to her job at Planned Parenthood, she was wary of making the jump from activism to candidacy, because she was afraid of losing. So she decided to get the losing speech out of the way off the bat.

“I don’t really