Despite a crush of stories that suggest he is losing suburbs largely due to women deserting him, President Trump is seeing a surge in donations from women and is tops in receiving big checks from suburban women.
He has the most big-dollar suburban women donors, 10,534, and has received the most from them, $8,293,135, than any of the Democrats, according to a study from OpenSecrets.org, part of the Center for Responsive Politics.
Overall, he ranks fifth in donations from women at $15.1 million. The leader is Sen. Bernie Sanders at $17.1 million, according to the group.
Statistically, 28% of Trump’s “itemized contributions” from women in 2016. For the 2020 election, they are 35%.
But it could be higher, and likely is, said OpenSecrets. That is because it is easier to get information on small donors who give $200 or less from Democrats than the Trump campaign.
Explained the donor analysis, “Campaigns are not required to itemize donations of $200 or less, so we do not have demographic information about Trump’s small donors giving to his joint fundraising committees with the Republican National Committee, Trump Victory and the Trump Make America Great Again Committee. An estimated 59% of Trump’s donations are from small-donors, so Trump’s contributions from women are most certainly higher than $15 million. Trump’s totals are underestimated more than the other candidates. Because Democrats are relying on ActBlue and the Republicans are not relying on the Republican equivalent WinRed as significantly, we only have most (not all) donor demographic data for Democratic small-dollar donors.”
While women donors are more pro-Democrat, according to the report, they are not a “monolith” and are clearly open to backing Trump.
In fact, the report ends with a description of the Women for Trump effort in several states that has drawn in donations.
“Trump is heavily relying on white women, especially independents and those who live in the suburbs, to bring him to victory in 2020 as they did in 2016. Although there is declining support for Trump from women shown in some polls, Trump campaign aides and officials argue the polling data does not account for suburban women who favor Trump but do not feel comfortable publicly saying so,” said the report.
