US voters say they’re prepared for a girl president − however sexist attitudes nonetheless go together with opposition to Harris

Since President Joe Biden exited the presidential race on July 21, 2024, and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris because the Democratic presidential nominee, Harris’ marketing campaign has generated widespread enthusiasm and a focus. She shortly grew to become the official Democratic presidential nominee and erased Donald Trump’s lead over Biden in nationwide and swing-state polling.

Harris and her operating mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, have additionally drawn tens of hundreds of supporters to their current rallies in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona and Nevada.

Though issues may change dramatically over the subsequent two-plus months, there’s a actual risk that the US could lastly elect its first feminine president.

However in polling that we performed in August 2024, after Harris grew to become the presumptive Democratic nominee, we discovered that sexism remains to be a strong power in American politics.

Hope and alter?

Sure, the scars of the 2016 marketing campaign – through which sexism performed a key position in Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s defeat by Trump – are nonetheless recent for Democrats. However many hope that America has modified and has change into extra accepting of ladies in management roles.

Harris’ gender, this argument goes, received’t be a major deterrent for voters.

On the floor, our current nationally consultant survey of 1,000 American adults helps this, with 51% of People agreeing with the assertion: “America is prepared for its first African American feminine president.” Solely 23% of People disagreed.

Even so, some Republicans seem to assume they’ll win by making gender a problem within the marketing campaign. That is obvious within the sexist rhetoric that Trump and different Republicans are utilizing when speaking about Harris.

Trump, who has a historical past of constructing sexist statements, asserted that international leaders would regard Harris as a “play toy,” referred to her as unintelligent, and is now commenting on her look. Each The Related Press and The New York Instances have reported – primarily based on unnamed sources – that Trump has additionally referred to as Harris a “bitch” in non-public, though Trump’s spokesman denied he used that time period.

In an analogous sexist vein, Trump allies have tried to show Harris’ previous romantic relationships into marketing campaign points, with one conservative commentator on Fox Enterprise Information crudely labeling Harris the “authentic hawk tuah lady,” an obscene sexual reference.

Will such makes an attempt to exploit sexism as an electoral technique backfire? Or, in any case these years, may it nonetheless be out of attain for a girl to beat sexist stereotypes and win the very best workplace in the US?

Understanding the significance of sexism

We’re political scientists who examine the position of identification in American politics and who conduct polls that discover People’ views on gender and the extent to which sexism nonetheless pervades the nation.

We performed two nationwide polls this 12 months – one in January 2024 when Biden was nonetheless within the race, and the opposite in August 2024, after Harris grew to become the presumptive Democratic nominee. For every ballot, we surveyed 1,000 American adults 18 and older and requested about their ideas on the election, their coverage views and their attitudes towards numerous teams in society.

With the change on the high of the Democratic ticket, we are able to higher assess the influence of sexism on vote alternative within the presidential election by evaluating the outcomes from January, when the race featured two male candidates, with August, when Harris entered the race.

In each surveys, we first requested respondents which candidate they’d vote for if the presidential election had been held at the moment.

To measure sexism, we then requested respondents whether or not they agreed or disagreed with a collection of three statements that specific prejudice, resentment and animus towards girls, or what political scientists name “hostile sexism.” The statements within the “hostile sexism” battery are: “Ladies search to realize energy by getting management over males”; “Ladies are too simply offended”; and “Ladies exaggerate issues they’ve at work.” Better settlement with these statements indicated extra sexist views.

We additionally measured respondents’ demographics – together with age, gender, race, training and earnings – their political attitudes and identities, and their racial views.

Sexism mattered, even when Biden was within the race

Due partially to Trump’s sexist rhetoric all through his campaigns and presidency, sexist attitudes have change into intently linked with whom people help for president. On common, extra sexist people have tended to want Republican candidates in current elections.

Thus, even in our January ballot when Biden was the Democratic nominee, sexism was strongly correlated with help for Trump. After we examined a head-to-head matchup between Biden and Trump, the extra people agreed with the statements measuring hostile sexism, the extra seemingly they had been to want Trump over Biden.

Of those that most strongly disagreed with the statements measuring hostile sexism, 73% supported Biden, whereas roughly two-thirds of these scoring highest on the sexism scale supported Trump.

Considering different components that affect help for Biden – partisanship, ideology, racial attitudes, training, financial views and so forth – we discovered that these with the least sexist views had an 83% likelihood of supporting Biden, whereas these with probably the most sexist views had a 17% likelihood of doing so.

With Harris, sexism issues extra

If sexism depressed people’ help for Biden’s candidacy, does that imply Harris faces no extra penalty when it comes to misplaced help for her candidacy? Hardly.

Hostile sexism, as we measured it, prices Harris votes.

Whereas sexism mattered in January, it mattered extra in August as soon as Harris had taken over the Democratic ticket.

In a head-to-head matchup between Harris and Trump, 89% of these within the lowest third on the sexism scale – which means those that disagreed most with the statements measuring hostile sexism – help Harris in contrast with 11% for Trump. Then again, solely 18% of these scoring highest on sexism help Harris, versus 82% for Trump.

After we keep in mind different issues that affect whether or not people want Harris or Trump, our findings are much more hanging. The least sexist respondents have a 92% likelihood of claiming they’ll vote for Harris. However probably the most sexist respondents have solely a 4% likelihood of supporting her.

What this implies is that, whereas sexist attitudes influenced people’ presidential preferences when Biden was the Democratic presidential nominee, they’ve a higher impact now that Harris is the Democratic candidate.

With out sexism

Since Harris appears to be narrowly main Trump within the polls, why ought to we care in regards to the affect of hostile sexism within the election?

To reply this query, think about a world through which hostile sexism doesn’t affect attitudes towards presidential candidates who’re girls. Our findings indicate that, in such a world, Harris’ lead over Trump could be bigger. Put merely, hostile sexism helps to make the election nearer than it might in any other case be.

Sexism has lengthy performed a strong position in influencing People’ voting conduct and attitudes towards political points. That is particularly so at the moment, given the excessive political significance of gender-related points corresponding to abortion, contraception and LGBTQ+ rights.

Our evaluation reveals that folks with unfavorable attitudes towards girls are a lot much less more likely to help Harris for president. Whether or not the Harris marketing campaign can efficiently navigate this actuality remains to be to be decided.