Women around the country are celebrating Hillary Clinton’s historic candidacy by embracing her not-exactly-haute couture. | AP Photo Activists hope Pantsuit Nation becomes Clinton’s army

As President Barack Obama had Organizing for America to push his agenda after he entered office, Hillary Clinton may want to call on the Pantsuit Nation if she’s elected.

With a Facebook group that had grown to 2.8 million members on Election Day — and #PantsuitNation hashtags going viral on Twitter and Instagram — women around the country are celebrating Clinton’s historic candidacy by embracing her not-exactly-haute couture. And Clinton’s allies are already looking past Nov. 8 to keep the two-week-old movement going.


“I hope it has a life after this election, because I’d like to see it turn into more than just a Facebook page and more of a movement,” said Andrea Dew Steele, founder of Emerge America, which trains Democratic women to run for office.

On Tuesday afternoon, the candidate sent a note of thanks to the group, which was founded by a set of about 50 Clinton-supporting friends several weeks ago and has grown exponentially since then.

“For some of you, it's been difficult to feel like you could wear your support on your sleeve -- and that's why this community has been such a special place,” Clinton wrote, in a note posted by her digital director Jenna Lowenstein. “Your stories and photos of family members and friends are wonderful to see, but what truly warms my heart is the thousands of comments of support and love you all send to each other.”

Clinton concluded, “Tonight, I hope we'll finally break through that highest, hardest glass ceiling together, and use those pantsuits for the best occasion of all — celebrating!”

Lowenstein also said Clinton had been told about women paying tribute to the suffragette Susan B. Anthony on Tuesday. Clinton supporters say the focus on Donald Trump's controversial campaign, and Clinton's own issues and lagging favorability, have obscured grassroots support for her campaign.

The pantsuits and posts are all signs of “pent-up enthusiasm,” said Steele.

While the first black president was able to muster a movement behind his insurgent candidacy, Clinton was never able to marshal a similar groundswell. Her struggle to move past a bitter primary and then overcome both an email scandal and Donald Trump’s explosive candidacy has made it hard, her backers said, to celebrate. Summertime polls suggested there was an enthusiasm gap, with Trump’s supporters more gung-ho about voting for him, even if Clinton had more net support.

But women’s group leaders say informal trends and memes like Pantsuit Nation — and the outpouring of self-identified “Nasty Women” after the third debate — are evidence that Clinton is inspiring more passion in women than she gets credit for.

"The press has not covered and has, in my opinion, almost suppressed the excitement of women,” said Feminist Majority president Eleanor Smeal. “I don’t think they understand it.”

Even if Clinton has struggled to completely win over hardcore progressives after her bruising primary fight with Sen. Bernie Sanders, Smeal said it would be a mistake to conflate progressives with women’s rights voters.

“They’ve been talking about the lack of trust — it is not in the feminist movement, I can tell you that,” she said.

The Pantsuit Nation phenomenon involves women posting pictures of themselves — often in the eponymous Clinton uniform — before or after they’ve gone to the polls, along with personal anecdotes about their support for the campaign and tributes to suffragette ancestors.

Despite its size, the group is private in a bid to keep out negative comments. As the group neared 3 million members on Tuesday afternoon, women in pantsuits mobilized on the National Mall in Washington. The response has professional advocates in Washington thinking the pantsuits might have some staying power.

“We’ve been talking about it,” said Steele. Her group has trained 220 women who are also on the ballot, and for now, she’s encouraging them to make sure to post their Pantsuit Nation photos.

“It’s building a very on-fire, grassroots movement. And when you’ve got the troops, you’ve got the energy behind you and they’re even having a good time doing it, it gives so much energy to the campaign,” Smeal said.

Obama ultimately struggled to channel his electoral coalition into an effective network of advocates for his policies. For Clinton, the same challenge remains.

“I see a lot of spontaneous advocacy,” Smeal said. “So it won’t all be organized.”