Madeleine Albright, the first female U.S. secretary of state, on Thursday said women have to work harder than men just to be taken as seriously as the opposite sex.
“You [women] are going to have to work twice as hard. It’s just a simple truth … there’s plenty of room for mediocre men, there is no room for mediocre women,” Albright said during a call with the Skimm, a subscription newsletter aimed at millennial women.
Albright, who served from 1997 to 2001 in the Clinton administration, said she used to leg press 450 pounds just to show that she could “kick ass.”
The former top diplomat spoke with the Skimm’s “No Excuses” platform, which the female-owned company created in 2016 with the intent of helping 110,000 people – Democrats, independents, Republicans, and others – to register to vote.
Albright, 81, said she thinks Democrats and Republicans can agree the midterms will be “most important one of our lifetime.”
Despite the importance of this election, she said her generation is expected to turn out at higher rates than millennials, based on previous election demographics.
“If there’s one thing that history suggests it’s that young people will turn out at a far lower rate than people like me,” she said.
“That, to me, makes absolutely no sense because the decisions that are going to be made in the next Congress on matters of war and peace, the environment, our economy, and the education system will affect the lives of the young people far more than the older generation,” Albright said.
All 435 seats in the House of Representatives, 33 of the Senate’s 100 seats, as well as state and local offices will be decided Tuesday, Nov. 6.
