{"slug": "bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect", "title": "Bulletproof vests, security cameras, guns: The ways women in elected office protect themselves from abuse", "summary": "State Sen. Aisha Wahab received a custom bulletproof vest from the Senate after threats on her life spiked within 24 hours of her introducing a civil rights bill banning caste discrimination. Women in elected office across the Bay Area face higher rates of abuse than men, forcing them to adopt extra security measures such as home surveillance upgrades and altered public routines. California raised the annual security expense cap for elected officials from $5,000 to $10,000 and extended funding to cover family members after threats tied to their roles.", "body_md": "**Getting your**\n\n[Trinity Audio](//trinityaudio.ai)player ready...State Sen. Aisha Wahab was no stranger to receiving threats in her work as a legislator – from deranged warnings of death or rape to being sent sniper-scope images paired with writings about her religion.\n\nBut within 24 hours of introducing a civil rights bill proposing a ban on discrimination based on caste — a system of social class used in some immigrant communities — the threats on her life spiked to such a high level that the Senate offered to have her fitted for a custom bulletproof vest, she said.\n\n**RELATED: An ‘occupational hazard’: Even in California, women in elected office face more abuse than men**\n\n“It’s heavy and uncomfortable – a stark reminder that standing up for civil rights carries real risk, even here in California,” Wahab said. “Threats take a toll: on me, my family, and my staff. We’re human.”\n\nWahab’s case is severe but indicative of a wider trend for women serving in elected office across the Bay Area – the necessity of implementing safety measures, often with a mental or financial burden, in [response to threats to their safety](https://wp.me/p7ShJJ-QOFv).\n\n“They have to take extra time, extra precautions, special tactics to stay safe,” said Maya Kornberg, a senior research fellow and manager of the Elections and Government Program at nonpartisan policy organization the Brennan Center for Justice. “Women in office, and especially women of color, were sharing all of just the extra work and labor and time to adopt special tactics to just be able to do their work and stay safe.”\n\nWomen in elected office face abuse at a higher rate than their male counterparts, necessitating the burden of implementing extra security measures to stay safe, according to a 2024 study conducted by the Brennan Center, which is based out of New York University’s School of Law. From upgrading security systems at their homes, relying on staff members to walk them to their cars and altering their habits while out in public, these women have had to adapt to face the intersecting vulnerabilities of being a woman and serving in public office.\n\n“As a woman, I think inherently we have been taught to protect ourselves – carry our keys between our hands, not to park in a very dark place, close to an exit, all of these things,” said Santa Clara County Supervisor Sylvia Arenas. “We are always on that defensive, and it’s hard to carry out public policy when you are on a defensive this way.”\n\nCalifornia has implemented initial measures to lift the burden of security for elected officials. Bills put forward by Assemblymember Mia Bonta and signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom raised the cap on annual security expenses from $5,000 to $10,000 and allowed that funding to also pay for security expenses for a candidate or official’s family if they have experienced threats specifically tied to their role as a candidate or elected official.\n\nBonta was spurred to take action by her own experiences, coupled with those she saw her fellow female candidates have on the campaign trail, she said.\n\n“I came into this thinking that we should be able to run as women and not be subjected to violence and being targeted in that way,” Bonta said. “It was about time that we created an opportunity for us to be able to have some recourse – to be able to feel a little bit safer in the work that we do.”\n\nGovernments have some safety resources available to elected officials, whether that’s pipelines to report threatening incidents, assistance obtaining restraining orders or law enforcement presence for events, elected officials said. This includes safety precautions at city hall or county buildings where public meetings are held, such as metal detectors or patrolling security guards.\n\nAfter threatening incidents, law enforcement can temporarily station an officer outside an elected official’s home – which both San Jose Vice Mayor Pam Foley and Dev Davis, former San Jose city council member, have experienced after receiving threats, they said. Some jurisdictions also can send officers to community events to provide security — but electeds noted that they must sometimes be careful of how police presence would be perceived by the community.\n\n“Not all communities, especially the more marginalized communities, may react positively to seeing a sheriff’s deputy at a town hall,” Alameda County Supervisor Nikki Fortunato Bas said. “I want to make sure people feel comfortable just really engaging with us.”\n\nStaff members of many elected officials also take on varying levels of the burden of sifting through and dealing with threats, such as filtering out threats sent to the office via email or phone — sometimes even making reports to law enforcement before informing their boss.\n\n“I didn’t ask for details because the details would have made me … (pay) more attention and I would have been more likely to ruminate,” Davis said. “It was just like, ‘Okay, we’re dealing with it, it’s being handled, I don’t need to know the details – as long as it’s about me and not about my kids.”\n\nArenas described her team as “a partition.”\n\n“I’ve also had my staff have to be on the other end of picking up a phone call or reading over mail that’s been sent over – to have to be exposed to that themselves, which is also terrible,” Bonta said.\n\nMany elected officials, including San Mateo County Supervisor Noelia Corzo and Arenas, have staff members walk them to their cars, they said.\n\nDespite the availability of safety resources through local governments, these measures are often inadequate and lawmakers still have the necessity of taking extra precautions themselves, according to the Brennan Center study.\n\nSeveral women in elected office said that they have utilized Bonta’s bill to pay for security upgrades, including State Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, who was able to redirect some campaign funding to redo her security systems, she said. Others paid for their own security upgrades before the bill was signed into law.\n\nBut other women who have employed the bill note that they still wish that security was not necessary.\n\n“It’s money I have to raise for (the security) purpose versus communicating with voters, which is what I should be spending those resources on,” Fortunato Bas said.\n\nAfter beginning to receive threats, Fortunato Bas installed automatic lights and upgraded her home security system, she said. Foley also installed additional cameras at her home.\n\nDavis and her husband keep firearms and ammunition in their home in locked cases, she said. Davis and Corzo carry around pepper spray, they said.\n\nMany women in elected positions have changed their habits with security in mind, they said. Before serving in elected office, Fortunato Bas used to be a runner, but now, she tries not to go out in public on her own because of the threats she has faced.\n\n“It’s somewhat second nature now, but it can feel very restricting,” Fortunato Bas said. “I would like to be able to go for a walk in my neighborhood.”\n\nAfter vitriol surrounding an LGBTQ+ resolution Foley supported, she began to park her car in her garage, wait for the electric door to close completely, then exit out the garage’s front door for safety – a habit she continues to this day, she said.\n\n“We’ve just created these practices … originating from maybe a moment of threat, and then just keeping them as practice in the same way that you keep those keys in between your fingers as you walk towards your car – it’s just something that now is your practice,” Arenas said. “You don’t think about it.”", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect", "canonical_source": "https://www.mercurynews.com/2026/05/29/bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect-themselves-from-abuse/", "published_at": "2026-05-29 11:00:05+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-05-29 11:24:54.219859+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-policy", "ai-ethics"], "entities": ["Aisha Wahab", "Maya Kornberg", "Brennan Center for Justice"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/bulletproof-vests-security-cameras-guns-the-ways-women-in-elected-office-protect.jsonld"}}