Facing a Historic Gender Gap, Trump Decides to Browbeat Women
The former president is doubling down on paternalism and contempt.
Based on his recent speeches and social media posts, it’s clear that Donald Trump is very worried about his unpopularity with women—as well he should be. The gender gap is Trump’s weak point as a candidate, a problem he is singularly ill-equipped to solve.
An NBC poll released on Sunday added further evidence that Kamala Harris has a solid (although not insurmountable) lead in the national vote and also showed that the gender divide is the crucial battleground for this election. The overall results show Harris leading Trump by 49 percent to 44 percent. The more interesting results were in the cross-tabs. Among women, Harris led by 58 to 37 percent—a net difference of 21 percentage points. By way of contrast, in 2016, the last time Trump faced off against a female rival, Hillary Clinton led women by 54 to 39 percent, a net difference of 15 points. Among men, the NBC poll has Trump leading by 52 to 40 percent, 12 points ahead. This is a slight improvement of Trump’s position in the 2016 results, where Trump led Hillary Clinton 52 to 41 percent, an 11-point difference. In other words, compared to 2016, Trump is doing markedly worse with women and slightly better among men.
A CBS analysis of another poll found a comparable widening gender gap. As CBS reported, “In the most recent national Suffolk University/USA Today poll, women favor the Democrats by 21 points, nearly double the all-time largest gender gap run up by Bill Clinton over Bob Dole in 1996.”
It’s hardly surprising that gender is a deepening divide. As in 2016, the prospect of a female president is polarizing men and women into different camps. Significantly, the gender gap significantly decreased in 2020, when Trump and Biden basically ran even with men and Biden led by only 10 points over Trump (54 to 54 percent) with women. In 2016, Clinton made her pioneering role as the potential first female president a big part of her campaign, with talk of shattering the glass ceiling to the tune of Rachel Platten’s “Fight Song.” Harris has avoided this type of rhetoric, in part out of fear that it might—as arguably it did in 2016—alienate swing voters. More importantly, this election takes place after the Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade, so abortion has prominence as an issue with a life-or-death urgency that speaks to ordinary women much more intensely than the glass ceiling in the White House. Another factor, which Harris bought up in her debate with Trump, is that last year a court found him guilty of raping and defaming E. Jean Carroll.
Hoping to solve his gender deficit, Donald Trump on Friday addressed American women with a lengthy all caps post on Truth Social:
WOMEN ARE POORER THAN THEY WERE FOUR YEARS AGO, ARE LESS HEALTHY THAN THEY WERE FOUR YEARS AGO, ARE LESS SAFE ON THE STREETS THAN THEY WERE FOUR YEARS AGO, ARE MORE DEPRESSED AND UNHAPPY THAN THEY WERE FOUR YEARS AGO, AND ARE LESS OPTIMISTIC AND CONFIDENT IN THE FUTURE THAN THEY WERE FOUR YEARS AGO! I WILL FIX ALL OF THAT, AND FAST, AND AT LONG LAST THIS NATIONAL NIGHTMARE WILL BE OVER. WOMEN WILL BE HAPPY, HEALTHY, CONFIDENT AND FREE! YOU WILL NO LONGER BE THINKING ABOUT ABORTION, BECAUSE IT IS NOW WHERE IT ALWAYS HAD TO BE, WITH THE STATES, AND A VOTE OF THE PEOPLE – AND WITH POWERFUL EXCEPTIONS, LIKE THOSE THAT RONALD REAGAN INSISTED ON, FOR RAPE, INCEST, AND THE LIFE OF THE MOTHER – BUT NOT ALLOWING FOR DEMOCRAT DEMANDED LATE TERM ABORTION IN THE 7TH, 8TH, OR 9TH MONTH, OR EVEN EXECUTION OF A BABY AFTER BIRTH. I WILL PROTECT WOMEN AT A LEVEL NEVER SEEN BEFORE. THEY WILL FINALLY BE HEALTHY, HOPEFUL, SAFE, AND SECURE. THEIR LIVES WILL BE HAPPY, BEAUTIFUL, AND GREAT AGAIN!
It’s tempting to dismiss this as a typically Trumpian unhinged rant. After all, the argument that “you will no longer be thinking about abortion” because it is in the hands of the states is obviously absurd. It’s precisely because so many states have introduced punitive anti-abortion laws that the issue has become so contentious. Further, his lie that babies are being killed “after birth” has been repeatedly debunked.
Beyond that, the entire tone of the post is all wrong: The all-caps makes it look like the shouting of a bully and the words themselves are patronizing and contemptuous.
Yet Trump repeated the words of the post in a rally in North Carolina on Saturday. In other words, the post was no one-off—but a considered part of Trump’s campaign rhetoric.
To confirm that he had nothing to offer women but scorn, Trump in a Truth Social post on Saturday complained that a TV program “had ‘dumb as a rock’ bimbo Stephanie Ruhle, from MSDNC.” Another post complained about Oprah Winfrey’s endorsement of Harris. Another attack on a prominent Harris supporter simply read, “I hate Taylor Swift.”
It’s not surprising that Trump’s approach to the gender gap is so openly scornful and bitter. He is a lifelong misogynist whose sexism has served him well: His insults of Hillary Clinton helped rally the right in 2016. Trump’s goal is clearly not to decrease the gender gap he has with women but to increase the gap with men, which would in fact improve his standing in the polls. But 2024 is unlikely to work out as well for Trump as 2016. The improvement he has with men is only marginal compared to 2016, while his deficit with women is historically unprecedented. If that gender gap holds strong, Trump is heading for a trouncing.
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Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation
