Eight years after electing the first black president, American voters appear poised, based on an avalanche of polling, to elect the country’s first female president. But if Hillary Clinton indeed emerges as the winner on Nov. 8 it might be in spite of her gender, not because of it.
A new poll by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution shows the Democratic former secretary of state narrowly trailing Republican Donald Trump in Georgia. It also revealed a huge gender gap: Clinton leads with female voters by more than 10 points, while among men, Trump holds a 15 percentage point lead. Libertarian Gary Johnson has the support of 9 percent of female voters and 8 percent of men.
Clinton would make history as the first female president, breaking, as she once put it, “that highest and hardest glass ceiling.” For many women that momentous occasion will be a reason to celebrate, while Clinton’s tremendous unpopularity threatens to take the shine off the occasion for others.
But, for those women who don't support Clinton, Republican Donald Trump's comments about forcibly groping and kissing women, followed by a parade of women accusing him of sexual assault or unwanted attention make him, too, an unacceptable choice.
So, what’s a woman to do?
If you are Rebecca Digiuro, you reluctantly vote for Clinton.
The DeKalb County Republican said she cannot, “in good conscience” vote for Trump.
“He is one of the most abhorrent public figures I have ever seen,” Digiuro, a 43-year-old stay at home mom, said.
Digiuro said she’s no fan of Clinton, either, but Trump is unacceptable.
“I honestly think there’s something seriously wrong in his head,” she said. “I have a 9-year-old and a 7-year-old. The fact he says whatever pops in his head, people think that’s a good thing. We teach impulse control to our children and Donald Trump doesn’t have any.”
Erica Wyatt, 41, of Atlanta, is also voting for Clinton. But unlike Digiuro, she’s excited about it.
“It’s just seeing a woman being that strong and all the things she’s gone through her entire political career,” Wyatt said. “To see her stand up there and accept that nomination, I was moved. I was actually in a hotel room on a work trip and crying and said, ‘Wow, there is a woman standing there.’”
Wyatt said she thought of her nieces who will be able to say, “You know what? One day I can be president, or I can lead this organization, or I can be the one who takes charge at work. It empowers little girls.”
Despite the gender-laced politics of this campaign, plenty of Republican women are eagerly supporting Trump.
Kathy Potts liked the New York businessman from the start of the long Republican primary. She worked to elect Georgia Republican David Perdue to the U.S. Senate in 2014 and sees similarities between the two men: political outsiders and businessmen “who sign the front of the check.”
Potts, 58 a longtime Duluth resident who is moving to Florida, cares about the debt, the makeup of the U.S. Supreme Court and veterans.
She said all the hand wringing over Trump’s raunchy comments is overblown.
“It sort of makes me laugh. He was in the entertainment industry,” she said.
“Between us girls, we don’t want anyone recording us when we talk about men,” Potts said. “Men and women talk trash about other men and women.”
She also wasn’t swayed by the women who have come forward saying they were groped by Trump calling them “a bunch of false allegations.” She speculated the women may have been paid by the Clinton camp.
“What I find more offensive is the way Hillary treats other women,” Potts said. “He (Bill Clinton) took advantage of that intern.”
“I get kind of physically ill thinking about putting the Clintons back in the White House,” Potts said.
Jennifer Lawless, director of the Women & Politics Institute at American University in Washington, said the country has become so politically polarized that even something as historic as a woman becoming president is a fractured occasion.
“All of this is mediated and conditioned on party identification in the first place,” Lawless said. “It has to do with the party of the candidate.”
In other words, women voters who are firmly Republican are as unlikely to vote for Clinton as Democratic women would have been to vote for Carly Fiorina, had the former Hewlett Packard CEO won the GOP nomination.
But, Lawless said, there is something that can make a difference.
“One thing that can really upset that is if you have a candidate on one side or the other who is just unpalatable with a large section of the voters,” she said.
Enter, Donald Trump.
“This time around all of that is sort of being thrown up in the air because of the Trump campaign,” Lawless said. “The way he’s speaking about women and what that means to women who traditionally vote Republican or are traditionally independent. This time because of the sexist remarks we see Clinton doing far better.”
Sixty-three percent of female voters in Georgia believe Clinton is qualified to be president, compared to 49 percent of men, although nearly six in 10 women believe she is not honest and trustworthy, the poll found. As in many cases, those numbers reverse for Trump. Only 37 percent of women say he is qualified, compared to 52 percent of men.
Trump was struggling with women before the release of the 2005 "Access Hollywood" video that devastated his campaign, and before a parade of women came forward to accuse him of making unwanted advances or trying to force himself upon them.
This so-called gender gap is not new. Based on exit polling, no Republican presidential candidate has won a majority of the national female vote since then-Vice President George H.W. Bush in 1988.
Now, traditional Republican women are abandoning Trump as well.
Republican U.S. Senator Susan Collins of Maine, Sally Bradshaw, an aide to former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, and former Chris Christie advisor Maria Comella have said they won’t support the GOP nominee. Hewlett Packard CEO Meg Whitman, who ran for governor of California as a Republican, publicly rejected Trump and has been campaigning for Clinton.
Here in Georgia, Tricia Pridemore, a former aide to Gov. Nathan Deal, former candidate for state GOP chairman and U.S. Congress, said, "I'm out. Not voting for him," after the damning video was released earlier this month. "Skipping the presidential on my ballot," she said on Twitter. "Can't hold my nose hard enough in 2016."
But, like many Republicans who have given up on Trump, Pridemore said she also can’t go for the Democrat.
Amanda Turchin could have been a Trump voter. Now, she said, “he disgusts me.”
“When he first started running, the door was open a little bit for him,” said the 35-year-old mother of two. Turchin said early on she liked Trump’s independence and outsider status. She disagreed with his hard line stance on immigration, but was willing to give him a look.
Then he started talking about women.
“The fat shaming, the idea that looks are the most important thing,” she said. Next came the “Access Hollywood” tape where Trump talked about groping women.
“Boy, then the door just slammed shut,” Turchin said.
“I’ve worked with guys like him before and and they are resentful toward strong, powerful women.”
Turchin, who considers herself an independent, is voting for Clinton. The AJC poll found self-described independents supporting Trump over Clinton 41 percent to 38 percent.
The Dunwoody resident said the attacks on Clinton for her husband’s infidelities have only made her more sympathetic to the former first lady.
“I feel badly that he did all these terrible things behind her back. And I don’t think it’s fair to put those actions on her,” she said.
The AJC's poll found that Trump's treatment of women is a legitimate issue in the race for both men and women, while strong majorities of both also said Bill Clinton's past treatment of women is not .
Count Ellen Diehl among those who isn’t bothered by Trump’s comments about women.
“I’m focused on the issues,” she said, listing illegal immigration, national security and taxes as among those she cares about.
“I am looking for a strong person who will work to protect our country and keep us all safe,” said Diehl, of DeKalb County.
“For me, gender does not play a role (in who I vote for), just like color does not play a role,” she said.
Cindy Roberts, 49, lives in Oak Grove neighborhood of north DeKalb County. A a speech pathologist in a public school, she’s a Republican-leaning independent.
She’s not impressed by Clinton’s talk of breaking the glass ceiling of the presidency.
“Women are as ruthless as anyone else. … I want to vote for someone for their qualifications, not because they’re a woman,” Roberts said, and accused Clinton of “gender baiting.”
She’s not necessarily thrilled about it, but Roberts, who has one daughter in middle school and another in high school, said she’ll vote for Trump.
“I’m not interested in dating Donald Trump or marrying Donald Trump nor in having my girls’ date Donald Trump but if he can do something to stop the tide of the United States falling off the cliff, than I’m voting for it,” she said.
About the Author
