Brady O'Keefe discusses how the Gender Ideology Gap Influenced the Results of the US Presidential Election, in which Donald Trump became the 47th President of The United States
Since 2010, the number of American women aged 25 or older who have earned a bachelor's degree or higher has increased by 8.2 percentage points. Women have recently overtaken men in higher education enrollment, making up 58.6% of postsecondary enrollment in the United States.
Advanced degrees have allowed women in the US more independence than ever before. Because of increased agency, women are less likely to worry about how their vote will be perceived by those who may financially support them. This has led to many women voting in a way that is true to their political beliefs.
Additionally, college graduates are more likely to vote for liberal candidates. The increased rate at which women are achieving college degrees has led them to become a group that is more likely to vote liberal in elections.
Conversely, Men’s enrollment in higher education has dropped over the past ten years. Proportionally to this trend, men have voted much more conservatively in recent years. These inverse shifts among men and women have led to an alarmingly large gap between the ideologies of these two genders.
Evidently, the general trend of women voting for liberal candidates was not enough to secure Democratic candidate Kamala Harris the United States presidency.
Donald Trump ran a divisive campaign that largely appealed to young men. Right-wing influencers and podcasters have become a staple among many young men’s viewing habits.
Trump’s campaign worked to appeal to these content creators to win young men's votes, and it worked. Young men who consumed conservative content online were less exposed to the pressing issues that were deciding factors for minority voters. As a result, without thoroughly researching candidates, they cast their votes based on how the conservative media they consumed told them to.
The percentage of young men who voted for Donald Trump was up from the 2020 election. Although voter turnout was down among all demographics, men, especially young men, made up a substantial percentage of active voters. How young men voted decided the election.
There were many confounding factors that were the cause of Harris’ loss, but Trump’s grasp on young men was one of the most important ones. The influence of right-wing content creators on young, and oftentimes white, men has exacerbated the gender ideology gap.
The widening of the gender ideology gap is increasingly concerning for society. The ideology gap is widening at a faster rate than ever before, it seems. As the Republican Party is becoming significantly more right-wing, at the same time, a higher proportion of young men are beginning to support the party.
The unprecedented success of Trump and the Republican Party in the 2024 election will have wide-reaching implications for US policy. Starting in 2025, Republicans will have a majority in the House of Representatives and the Senate. These majorities, combined with Trump as the executive, will allow right-wing policy to pass very easily.
Many minority groups in the US are concerned that the passing of right-wing policies will strip them of their rights. As seen with Roe v. Wade, what is often considered to be a basic right by many, is in reality, not protected by the law.
There are also concerns surrounding the protection of other rights that exist only as Supreme Court decisions.
The gender ideology gap has paved the way for Republicans and the far-right to come to power, which is a worrisome sight for minorities who already have their rights in a precarious position in the United States.