Races lost in Senate

DiversityInc, a magazine that focuses on race in the workplace, found that only 6 percent of the of 4,100 Senate employees nationwide belong to a racial minority.

The article in the magazine’s June 2006 issue says, “People of color are virtually nonexistent when it comes to the most influential Washington, D.C.-based Senate aides.”

Racial minorities account for 7.6 percent of some 1,000 senior positions, whereas 24 percent of corporate managers are minorities.

The magazine’s reporters wrote in the article that they tried to contact all 100 senate offices but had little success in compiling data.

Illinois Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin and Barack Obama were cited as examples of senators who successfully hire minorities. Besides Obama, who is black, three senators are Hispanic and two are Asian-American.