Claiming he was “saving suburbia” at a campaign rally in Lansing, Michigan, the President pitched himself as the candidate for suburban women voters because he’s “getting your kids back to school” and “getting your husbands — they want to get back to work. We’re getting your husbands back to work.”
While Trump focused on “husbands” during his speech in Michigan on Tuesday, the coronavirus pandemic has had a much larger effect on women in the work place.
The President in recent months has openly begged for the support of what he calls the “suburban housewives of America.”
But Trump’s message to them has at times been delivered in what critics say are coded racist appeals, including claiming that efforts to increase affordable housing in the suburbs represented an existential threat.
“If (Biden) ever got to run this country and they ran it the way he wants to run it, our suburbs would be gone, our suburbs would be gone,” Trump said at the first presidential debate. “And you would see problems like you have never seen.”
With just days until the presidential election, it’s unclear what effect Trump’s efforts will have on the enormous gender gap hindering his reelection prospects.
In 2016, Trump averaged a 5 point advantage among White women after Sanders exited that race.
This means that Biden’s doing 18 points better among White women in CNN’s pre-election polls than Hillary Clinton did.