Pennsylvania's Women Voters Could Decide Trump's Fate

PENNSYLVANIA - Donald Trump is keenly aware that his fate in the upcoming presidential election could well depend on the votes of suburban women across the state.

In a recent rally in Johnstown, the president essentially begged for the support of female voters in the Keystone State.

"Suburban women: Will you please like me?" he asked. "Please. Please. I saved your damn neighborhood, OK?"

Polls show Trump trailing Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in Pennsylvania, a key swing state that the president won in 2016. The FiveThirtyEight aggregate shows the former vice president up by 7.2 percentage points.

That’s largely because the president’s support by women in Pennsylvania has eroded considerably. A recent Quinnipiac Univesity poll showed Biden leading Trump 60 percent to 37 percent among white women in Pennsylvania.

That’s bad news for Trump, who likely will need to win the key swing state of Pennsylvania to win a second term.

The Keystone State's 20 electoral votes are tied for fifth-most and Pennsylvania was one of three traditionally blue states that propelled Trump to victory in 2016. Trump was the first Republican presidential candidate to win Pennsylvania since George H.W. Bush in 1988.

But Trump's margin of victory over Hillary Clinton was minimal. More than six million votes were cast in Pennsylvania and Trump won by 44,000 - or less than one percent. Even a minuscule voter shift could shift the state to Biden.

Nationally, CNN reported that recent polling has Biden up by 25 points among women voters. According to the final 2016 pre-election polls, Clinton won women voters by 13 points among likely voters and 14 points among registered voters.

The Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University has been tracking gender differences in support for the major-party candidates in the 2020 presidential election at the national level and in battleground states.

The center’s website notes a 23-point edge for Biden among women voters nationally in a recent ABC News-Washington Post poll. The center also noted the commanding lead Biden has among women voters in the recent Quinnipiac University poll.

Despite those daunting numbers, Trump in Johnstown predicted a repeat of the 2016 election, in which political commentators and observers predicted he would not receive much support from women but ultimately did.

"We're going to see that the women really like Trump a lot," the president said.

Trump does have pockets of support among Pennsylvania women. C. Pinkus, a registered nurse and attorney from the Philadelphia area, is one of them.

“I am a Trump loyalist,” she told Patch. “I think he has done a remarkable job in terms of what his promises were and how they have been fulfilled.”

Pinkus said she supports Trump because of his conservative bent “and because he doesn’t play politics.”

Sarah Becker, a lifelong Republican, mother of three and former staffer in George W. Bush’s administration, doesn’t agree. The Mechanicsburg woman plans to vote for Biden.

"I truly remain dumbfounded that this is the reality we're living in," Becker recently said in a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation interview. "I can't believe it's real, even after four years."

Trump has tried to win over suburban women by saying he would uphold “law and order” and warning that Biden would “destroy” suburban communities with low-income housing.

“If Dems win, GOODBYE SUBURBS!” he recently tweeted.

Deborra Pancoe said she doesn’t see suburban women falling for such rhetoric in 2020.
“Honestly I don’t think anyone in these suburbs really buys that. I think people are appalled with his behavior and some of the words that are coming out of his mouth,” Pancoe told the Tribune News Service.

“So I don’t think it matters if you live in the suburbs or the city. The chaos, the distrust, the racism he espouses, it’s filtering down to a grassroots level and it’s affecting our whole society.”

A New York Times story on Sunday provided additional proof that Trump's woes with suburban women voters aren't exclusive to Pennsylvania. The Times reported that many females in Ohio who voted for Trump in 2016 now are backing Biden.

Kate Rabinovitch, who lives in a Cleveland suburb, told the Times that she voted for Trump four years ago and now is actively campaigning for Biden

When casting her ballot in 2016, “I thought, ‘Oh, what’s the worst that could happen?’” she told the Times.

“I do feel guilty.”