Lara Trump’s claim that Trump has appointed more women than any other president isn't true

Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law, claimed on International Women’s Day that President Trump has appointed more women than any other president, in addition to having the first woman in charge of a campaign.

The RNC, meanwhile, in a tweet said Trump appointed more women “than previous administrations.” In a March 10 Instagram post, the RNC made a similar claim, and yet oddly included photographs of the first and second ladies, who obviously are not appointed (and so far, in U.S. history, are all female.)...

So what does the data say?

Interestingly, there is little consistent analysis across administrations. Here are the best numbers we found.

● Knight-Ridder News Services found in 1993 that 37 percent of the first 512 appointees in the Bill Clinton administration were women.

● The Brookings Institution determined that 26 percent of George W. Bush’s first 264 nominations were women.

● The New York Times found about 43 percent of Barack Obama’s appointments were women at the start of his second term. Some departments, such as Health and Human Services, Education, Labor, and Housing and Urban Development had 50 percent or more female appointments under Obama.

As for Trump, we have two measures, indicating a range of 22 percent to 27 percent for female appointments. But the trend line may be getting worse.

● A Bloomberg analysis, using data obtained by ProPublica, found 27 percent of administration hires through March of 2017 were female.

● The Washington Post appointment tracker, run with the Partnership for Public Service, shows that 22 percent of Trump’s Senate-confirmed nominees so far are women. The tracker was updated as of March 9, 2017.