WOMEN VOTERS COULD WIN DEMOCRATS THE HOUSE AND DELIVER BIG BLOW TO DONALD TRUMP, POLL INDICATES
NEWSWEEK: WOMEN VOTERS COULD WIN DEMOCRATS THE HOUSE AND DELIVER BIG BLOW TO DONALD TRUMP, POLL INDICATES
By ALEXANDRA HUTZLER
Just months ahead of the highly contested 2018 midterm elections, female voters could make all the difference for the Democratic Party.
Democrats have taken a 12-point lead in hypothetical races for the House of Representatives this year, with women backing liberal candidates two-to-one, according to a poll released by Quinnipiac University. The margin could be enough for the Democrats to win back the House of Representatives during the general election this coming November.
The study also showed that only 32 percent of the women polled support Republican candidates while nearly 60 percent said they would vote for a Democratic candidate on the ballot this fall. Men, on the other hand, were much more divided on the issue with 46 percent leaning Republican and 44 percent leaning Democrat.
The results came as a record-breaking number of women are running for office, causing some to call the 2018 election cycle the latest “Year of the Woman.” As of March, at least 575 women had declared their intention to run for Congress or governor, according to a report by Politico.
As of July 24, 169 women have won their primary races, 179 lost their elections and 168 women have not yet reached their state’s primary elections, according to Bloomberg. Of those women, three-fourths are running as Democrats.
According to Emily’s List, an organization that recruits and trains women for public office, over 34,000 women reached out to them to register their interest in running for office after the 2016 election. In the statement announcing the statistic, the group’s president Stephanie Schriock said that “women are fired up in a way we have never seen before. They can’t wait to take action.”
@emilyslist
“As of this week […] 34,000 women across this country have raised their hand to run!” – @Schriock1 #ElectWomen #WeAreEMILY
The Quinnipiac poll also found that women are not supportive of President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nomination Brett Kavanaugh. Voters on the whole were divided, with 40 percent saying that the Senate should confirm the conservative judge and 41 percent saying the Senate should not confirm him.
Females, though, were opposed to Kavanaugh at a much higher rate than men. Forty-six percent of women polled said that they do not support Kavanaugh with just 32 percent voicing support for the longtime conservative judge.
Kavanaugh’s nomination has sparked much debate over whether another conservative judge on the high court will result in the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Democrats have argued that a vote for Kavanaugh would also be a vote to reverse the landmark 1973 decision that legalized abortion.
