Poll Shows Barack Obama Not Running Away With Women Voters Over McCain
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
August 5, 2008
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — A new poll finds pro-abortion candidate Barack Obama is not running away with women voters in the same way previous election cycles have had a gender gap. The survey shows neither Obama nor John McCain, who enjoys the backing of pro-life groups, have a majority of women backing them.
Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway of the Polling Company and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake of Lake Research Partners conducted the survey for the LifeTime television network.
According to the survey, Obama garnered 49% to McCain’s 38% with 6 percent of all women saying they are only leaning towards one candidate. Another 10 percent of women voters are still undecided.
Obama also holds an advantage among Independent women, who favor him by a twelve point margin (42-30 percent) but 20 percent of independent women are still undecided.
Obama enjoys a lead among women because he’s attracting 89% of African-American women and 62% of Hispanic women. At the same time, nearly half of Caucasian women surveyed favor McCain — with him leading 47 to 38 percent.
They survey also found women aren’t especially concerned about whether either candidate selects a woman as their running mate.
Obama’s selection of a woman running mate makes no difference to 55% of women voters, and McCain’s selection of a woman as his vice president makes no difference to 62%.
However, Obama would benefit twice as much as McCain from offering the second slot to a woman — with 29% more likely to support Obama if he picks a woman vs. 15% who would be more likely to support McCain.
In fact, selecting a woman as his running mate would hurt McCain with 20% saying they would be less likely to pick him if a woman were on his ticket. The poll also found 59 percent of women who backed Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary would not be motivated to support McCain if he picked a woman as his vice-president.
The poll found McCain would do better among women voters if they had more information about him.
While 37% feel mostly favorable toward McCain and 31% hold unfavorable views, about 20 percent of women say they don’t have enough information to decide. Just 14 percent of women don’t know enough about Obama.
The women who say they don’t like Obama gave a variety of reasons for opposing him, but his views on abortion and other issues came in second with 19 percent saying they don’t like him as a result.
The poll also found 18 percent of the women who backed Clinton in the primary are supporting McCain.
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