Over 4,600 women have signed up to lead community campaigns for President Trump’s 2020 reelection effort, evidence his team said that he is closing the gender gap with a message of economic empowerment and national security.
Campaign officials, in a message timed for today’s Women’s Equality Day celebrating passage of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote, told Secrets that the newly expanded “Women for Trump” army will focus on expanding support for the president in the suburbs with a “grassroots” bid to register voters.
They said that at last Thursday’s “National Day of Training” and “Evening to Empower” events, 4,614 attended in 16 states. That is double what they predicted.
Trump campaign officials said the turnout challenged media reports that women are rejecting the president, who won 41% of the female vote in 2016 when he ran against Hillary Clinton, the first woman presidential nominee. He also won 52% of the white women vote.
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“The fake news tries to convince everyone that women don’t support President Trump but Thursday proved them all wrong,” said campaign press secretary Kayleigh McEnany.
“Over 4,600 supporters showed up on August 22 on behalf of Women for Trump to participate in a Trump Victory Leadership Initiative training. These newly empowered supporters went out over the weekend and signed up thousands of new voters. Those grassroots efforts are what will help President Trump win again in 2020,” she added.
Over the weekend’s National Day of Action, the new volunteer team signed up 2,114 new voters.
Several key Trump aides hosted the Thursday “Evening to Empower” and training sessions including Kellyanne Conway and surrogates such as Kimberly Guilfoyle, Jessie Jane Duff, Penny Young Nance, president of Concerned Women for America, and former Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer.
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At many of the events, women lined up for hours to attend. “An hour out, this is the line to get into the Women for Trump event. Snakes down the hallway and around the corner. The room for the event has about 425-450 seats,” tweeted Tampa Bay Tribune reporter Steve Contorno. He said the first woman in line told him, “We want to disprove the myth that women aren’t for Trump. We are here.”
Recent polling has suggested that the president could be in trouble with women, especially in the suburbs. Several Democratic presidential candidates are focused on winning that vote, which could be a danger to the president’s hope of holding key battleground states including Pennsylvania and Michigan.
But campaign officials said that the president’s message on the economy and national security has steadied his support among women. The female unemployment rate is the lowest in 50 years.
Also, Ivanka Trump has led the president’s effort to expand job growth to women and win international support for women-run businesses.
Brewer, for example, tweeted, “Arizona women have always voted for kitchen table issues — not ideological delusions. It’s why we need to vote to re-elect @realDonaldTrump in 2020.”
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*see full story by The Washington Examiner