The group was founded by Jane Fonda, Barbra Streisand, and other women in the Greater Los Angeles area.

[6] 1992 also saw the HWPC assist in bringing a record number of women into the U.S. Senate, the accomplishment called the Year of the Woman.

Bergthold noticed in 1992 when she joined the group that many of the staffers had previous experience working on political campaigns with Fonda and Hayden.

[5] Typically, the HWPC backed the issues more than individual candidates; they were not pragmatic political players who would easily compromise.

[25] In July 1992 at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel, the HWPC hosted a fundraising dinner for nine women candidates running for U.S. Senate.

Lily Tomlin was master of ceremonies, and Streisand delivered the keynote speech, saying, "It’s time we had a place at the table where the life and death decisions of the country, the world and the planet are made.

[25] In 1994, the HWPC spent $10,000 to oppose two anti-gay bills in other states, Oregon's Ballot Measure 13, and a similar one in Idaho.

These efforts were victorious, unlike the funding of Rick Zbur's campaign during the 1996 U.S. House of Representatives elections in California.

Zbur, running as an openly gay man, won his Democratic primary but lost to the Republican incumbent.

Bergthold said that HWPC's gay-friendly position on LGBT issues was based on the group's established stance regarding civil rights in general.

[27][28] The HWPC suffered a setback in 1994 when years' worth of New Left advances were swept aside in a rightward turn led by Newt Gingrich's Contract with America.

Clinton had just signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, a gesture of mollification to Gingrich and others on the right who were urging welfare reform.

They voted to disband in April 1997,[7][9][10] fulfilling contractual obligations through the end of June when they finally closed their doors.