Pioneering Spirit: Discussing Elections with Sen. Tammy Baldwin ’84

Smith’s student athletes aren’t just students, and they’re not just athletes: They’re also active citizens of the world—and of their local communities. And many of them are U.S. voters.

And so on Thursday, Oct. 22, just three hours before President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden took the stage for this year’s final presidential debate, the Smith Pioneers spent an hour talking with one of America’s leading legislators—Sen. Tammy Baldwin ’84 (D-WI)—about public service, next month’s election and how this year’s votes might affect young people tomorrow.

The event was the brainchild of Caleigh Johnson ’21, an economics major and volleyball team member from Georgetown, Texas, who leads Smith’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.

“Smith offers an amazing network and amazing alums, like Senator Baldwin,” Johnson said. “And for a lot of us, including me, this is the first election that we’ll be able to vote in. We wanted to talk with someone about why voting is important.”

Without telling anyone (“I didn’t want to get people’s hopes up”), Johnson reached out to Baldwin’s office through the senator’s website. A few weeks ago, when Baldwin’s office said that the senator would be glad to participate, Johnson worked with Athletic Director Kristin Hughes and other college staff to move quickly to make the event happen.

Key to making things work was Paula Torre-Nieto ’21, a Study of Women and Gender major and swim team member who serves as president of the Sports Committee for Inclusion and Diversity. Torre-Nieto helped solicit and shape questions from a full representation of student athletes, and co-hosted the debate-night discussion with Johnson. “I think the fact that we used to be teammates on the swim team helped me and Caleigh be effective as co-hosts,” Torre-Nieto noted. “We know how to communicate with each other.”

The event was fast-moving, informative and inspiring: Sixty minutes of student questions—solicited in advance from members of Smith’s 11 teams —covering topics ranging from voter suppression (there are many types, Baldwin noted, from gerrymandering to insufficient staffing that leads to long lines at polling places) to why young voters matter (“Democracy, when our founders conceived of it,” Baldwin said, “was a very radical idea. We have always, as a nation and a democracy, pushed for greater inclusion in that franchise”) to Baldwin’s favorite Smith tradition (Mountain Day, an event she still celebrates).

Johnson said she hoped the event would create a special place for student-athletes who, because of their academic and team schedules, don’t always feel able to participate in the full range of opportunities that Smith offers.

And her efforts were successful: Nearly 200 Pioneers—current and former student athletes, coaches and administrators—participated in the Zoom discussion.

The day after, Torre-Nieto said the event helped her think about voter suppression and voter turnout in a new way. “I was struck by what Senator Baldwin said about understanding how power works,” she noted. “That the people leading the conversation are the ones who decide which issues get discussed.”

For their part, both Johnson and Torre-Nieto have already both cast their absentee ballots.

“What I’ve learned,” Johnson said, “is that voting is your right. And that right is important. You should use it.”

Caleigh Johnson ’21 (bottom left) and Paula Torre-Nieto ’21 (bottom right) moderated a discussion with Sen. Tammy Baldwin ’84 (top) about young voters and this year’s election.