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HILL PEOPLE

PICTURES: Women Power: Fourteen Powerful Women on the Hill

By National Journal Staff

Updated: July 14, 2011 | 6:43 p.m.
June 29, 2011 | 12:35 p.m.

LORI SALLEY, HOUSE SMALL BUSINESS COMMITTEE-MAJORITY STAFF DIRECTOR (Patrice Gilbert)

Capitol Hill has always been a male-dominated workplace, but these 14 women are among those who have bucked that trend, rising to senior leadership positions. These staffers were interviewed as part of National Journal's recent "Hill People" issue, in which more than 300 senior leadership, committee, and political aides were profiled.

(RELATED: Hill Staffers Under 30 to Watch | 12 Things You Might Not Know About Key Hill Leadership Aides | 14 Powerful Women on the Hill | Hill People: Who Are They and Where Did They Come From?)

Capitol Hill offices and other subscribers can view more than 300 profiles of Hill aides and staffers at nationaljournal.com/hillpeople.

Hill Women

<p><h2>Nicole Scott</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, House Agriculture Committee<br />
Alma mater: University of Oklahoma<br />
Hometown: Waurika, Okla.<br />
Fun fact: On behalf of her grandfather, who spent 30 years in the Oklahoma House of Representatives, she handed out bumper stickers at rodeos and pie auctions.</p> - PHOTO: LIZ LYNCH

<p><h2>Debra Whitman</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Senate Aging Committee<br />
Alma mater: Gonzaga University and Syracuse University<br />
Hometown: Electric City, Wash.<br />
Fun fact: During her career, Whitman has focused on many of the issues that the committee tackles. Before joining it four years ago, she worked for the Congressional Research Service, where she led the agency’s research program into aging.</p> - PHOTO: CHET SUSSLIN

<p><h2>Helen Tolar</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Chief Counsel, House Veterans' Affairs Committee<br />
Alma mater: Converse College, University of South Carolina<br />
Hometown: Pensacola, Fla.<br />
Fun fact: Tolar had a “great awakening” one day in college. “I wanted to learn about people,” she says, but as a biology major she was instead “learning how to classify leaves, trees, and mushrooms.” She promptly switched to psychology.</p> - PHOTO: PATRICE GILBERT

<p><h2>Loretta Tuell</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Chief Counsel, Senate Indian Affairs Committee<br />
Alma mater: Washington State University; University of California, Los Angeles<br />
Hometown: Lapwai, Idaho<br />
Fun fact: Tuell grew up on the Nez Perce reservation and knew upon graduating from UCLA Law School that she wanted to fuse her career with her Native American heritage.</p> - PHOTO: RICHARD A. BLOOM

<p><h2>Lori Salley</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, House Small Business Committee<br />
Alma mater: University of California, Los Angeles<br />
Hometown: Arcadia Verdes, Calif.<br />
Fun fact: Before signing on as staff director, Salley worked at a nonprofit that dealt with childhood cancer.</p> - PHOTO: PATRICE GILBERT

<p><h2>Jean Bordewich</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Senate Rules and Administration Committee<br />
Alma mater: Brown University, George Washington University<br />
Hometown: Clearwater, Fla.<br />
Fun fact: As a Democratic Town Council member in Red Hook, N.Y., she voted on eminent-domain proceedings and set local tax rates.</p> - PHOTO: CHET SUSSLIN

<p><h2>Janet Poppleton</h2><br />
Majority Chief of Staff, House Science, Space, and Technology Committee<br />
Alma mater: Southern State College and Stephen F. Austin University<br />
Hometown: Stephens, Ark.<br />
Fun fact: Poppleton still recalls watching television footage of Neil Armstrong in 1969 as he became the first person to set foot on the moon; decades later, as a congressional aide, she witnessed Armstrong testify about the importance of continuing the manned space program.</p> - PHOTO: PATRICE GILBERT

<p><h2>Lily Batchelder</h2><br />
Majority Chief Tax Counsel, Senate Finance Committee<br />
Alma mater: Stanford University, Harvard University, Yale University<br />
Hometown: Brookline, Mass.<br />
Fun fact: Just out of Stanford with a bachelor’s in political science, Batchelder was already interested in economic policy but wanted real-world experience. After running the Stanford Homelessness Action Coalition, she joined the Jesuit volunteer corps based in Brooklyn, N.Y., for a year.</p> - PHOTO: RICHARD A. BLOOM

<p><h2>Yleem Poblete</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, House Foreign Affairs Committee<br />
Alma mater: St. Thomas University, University of Miami, Catholic University<br />
Hometown: Miami<br />
Fun fact: Poblete was just 8 when she first met her boss-to-be, Rep. <strong>Ileana Ros-Lehtinen</strong>, R-Fla. Poblete, who says she always had a “knack for dramatic arts,” performed at a dinner for Cuban political refugees and began chatting with the outgoing politician seated next to her at the dinner table.</p>
- PHOTO: LIZ LYNCH

<p><h2>Bettina Poirier</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Chief Counsel, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee<br />
Alma mater: Columbia University and New York University<br />
Hometown: Long Island, N.Y.<br />
Fun fact: Earlier in her career, Poirier was deputy assistant general counsel for pollution control at the Agriculture Department, where she worked on cleaning up mining and Superfund sites on U.S. Forest Service lands.</p>
- PHOTO: RICHARD A. BLOOM

<p><h2>Barrett Karr</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, House Education and the Workforce Committee<br />
Alma mater: Texas Christian University and George Washington University<br />
Hometown: Fort Worth, Texas<br />
Fun fact: Karr spent four years as President George W. Bush’s deputy assistant for legislative affairs.</p>
- PHOTO: LIZ LYNCH

<p><h2>Ellen Doneski</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee<br />
Alma mater: University of Michigan<br />
Hometown: Bethesda, Md.<br />
Fun fact: Doneski worked on the Democrats’ first attempt at health care reform during the Clinton administration and says she and a colleague would get to the Old Executive Office Building “at the crack of dawn” to attend meetings before typing up memos.</p>
- PHOTO: CHET SUSSLIN

<p><h2>Mary Naylor</h2><br />
Majority Staff Director, Senate Budget Committee<br />
Alma mater: Northwestern University<br />
Hometown: Fargo, N.D.<br />
Fun fact: Naylor began working in the office of Sen. <strong>Kent Conrad</strong>, D-N.D., after she graduated from Northwestern University in 1989, starting as an administrative assistant and rising to become budget staff director—a position she has held since 2001.</p>
- PHOTO: LIZ LYNCH

<p><h2>Shelley Rubino</h2><br />
Chief of Staff, House Democratic Caucus<br />
Alma mater: Eastern Connecticut State University<br />
Hometown: West Hartford, Conn.<br />
Fun fact: Rubino first worked for <strong>John Larson</strong>, D-Conn., in 1987, when he was president of the state Senate. “That’s where it all started,” she says of her 11-year arc in the General Assembly, where she also worked for the state House speaker before leaving to work at a Connecticut-based government-relations firm.</p>
- PHOTO: LIZ LYNCH

Hill Women

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