Women are tilting midterms to Democrats new poll reveals with many saying Trump is deciding factor

Democrats chances of winning the House of Representatives are improving thanks to strong support from women, a new poll revealed, and many of them are naming President Donald Trump as the deciding factor in their vote.

Female voters are proving to be the under lying foundation behind the party’s strong chances of victory in November.

A plurality of women, in a new CBS News poll, revealed they are checking the Democrats’ box at the ballot this fall with 46 percent saying they will go Democratic while 34 percent are supporting Republicans and 16 percent were not sure.

A plurality of women in a new CBS News poll said their vote this fall would be ‘in opposition’ to President Trump

Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand said Trump is the reason so many women are running for political office in 2018

Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand said Trump is the reason so many women are running for political office in 2018

The new poll also estimates Democrats could win 222 House seats – plus or minus an 11 seat margin of error. It takes 218 seats to control the chamber.

And Trump is proving to be key in women’s decision-making process.

A plurality named the president as a deciding factor in who they will support in the midterms: 39 percent of women said their vote would be ‘in opposition’ to Trump; 30 percent said it would for Trump and 31 percent said he’s not a factor.

And it’s his policies – not his personal life – that have women concerned.

In the poll, 59 percent of women said Trump’s policies and how he manages the government are the most important factor in their thinking about the president while 24 percent said it’s the values and culture he represents, and 17 percent said it’s how he handles himself personally.

Trump has proven to have a tougher time with women than with men. In the past month, the president has gotten better approval numbers from men than women in the Gallup daily tracking poll.

And while the president has bragged he won the women’s vote in the 2016 election, he actually only won non-college educated women. Hillary Clinton won the overall women’s vote.

But those non-college educated women were essential to his presidential win, meaning it’s a group he needs to keep in his corner as the 2020 election approaches. 

One Democratic senator said Trump is the reason so many woman threw their hat in the political ring this year.

‘The response to him being elected, I think, is this overwhelmingly — overwhelming desire of women to be heard, to be counted, and to fight back against what he stands for and what he said,’ said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, a Democrat from New York, on CBS’ ‘Face the Nation’ on Sunday morning.

‘Protest, anger, frustration and determination to protect their families,’ she said of women’s desire to be in the political arena.

A record number of women are running for office this year: 54 in the Senate (with 29 still in the running after the primaries) and 476 in the House (with 272 still in contention after the primaries), according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers. 

But the biggest message out of the poll was that women want to send a message to Washington D.C.: 67 percent said sending a message to the nation’s capitol is a big part of their vote. 

Marchers attend Women's March Los Angeles 2018 on January 20, 2018

Marchers attend Women’s March Los Angeles 2018 on January 20, 2018

Protesters walk during the Women's March on Washington on January 21, 2017

Protesters walk during the Women’s March on Washington on January 21, 2017

Turnout could hit record high in the midterms, which typically see fewer voters than in presidential elections: 69 percent of women and 83 percent of men said they definitely plan to vote in November. 

And 89 percent of women voters say their 2018 vote is at least as important as a vote in a presidential election.

Even some Republicans concede that even though Trump’s name won’t be on the ballot in November, the midterms will be about him.   

‘This is an up or down vote on President Trump,’ said former White House adviser Steve Bannon on MSNBC on Friday. ‘You know, this election’s going to come as a referendum on him. He permeates the entire political culture. And I think those that are around him are telling him that, ‘hey, it’s OK to lose the House. You can work with the Democrats and you can run against a Democratic House in 2020.’ It’s bad advice.’

The CBS News poll was conducted between August 10–16 with 4,989 respondents in 57 competitive and likely competitive congressional districts. The margin of error is 1.8 percent. It was conducted online by YouGov.

 



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