“IT GIVES ME HOPE”: MILLENNIAL WOMEN FLEX THEIR POLITICAL POWER, WITH MIXED RESULTS
After last week’s election, America’s two parties appear further apart than ever. Democrats reclaimed the House thanks to a record-breaking number of female candidates, including the nation’s youngest congresswoman (New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez), the first two Muslim congresswomen (Michigan’s Rashida Tlaib and Minnesota’s Ilhan Omar), and the first two Native American congresswomen (Kansas’s Sharice Davids and New Mexico’s Deb Haaland). Republicans, meanwhile, strengthened their hold on the Senate by embracing Donald Trump’s nationalist message. Voter turnout, which has always sagged during midterm elections, soared to a historic high. Millennial women, who were expected to play a consequential role in an election stacked with first-time female candidates, generally seem satisfied with the results, regardless of how they voted, but fewer are optimistic about the future. “I am proud that we have elected so many diverse members for the first time, but I am not proud of many members of the White House,” one respondent to a survey conducted by theSkimm wrote. “I am dissatisfied that while I saw so much progress, there were also many people who continue to support hate, and it is discouraging to see in this country that I believe in so much.”
The power of female millennial voters has been evident since the beginning of the Trump presidency, when millions of people turned up for the first Women’s March events in January 2017. But data about millennial women as a voting bloc—who they are and what they want—is scant. With this in mind, the Hive, theSkimm, and SurveyMonkey teamed up earlier this year to launch an editorial project in advance of the midterm elections: Millennial Takeover 2018, which aimed to better understand female millennials, what matters to them, and why.
The result is a snapshot of a complicated, and sometimes conflicted, generation. In general, millennial women were energized by the midterms. But even as many begin to recognize their influence as a voting bloc, others waver between positivity and cynicism in regard to their political impact. “I am optimistic for the younger generation of voters who showed up to the polls to have their voices heard,” one respondent to theSkimm’s survey wrote. “It gives me hope to see people in my community and across our nation getting involved.” Another was more ambivalent. “Our nation and my state is very clearly divided almost exactly down the middle, between two parties that completely oppose each other,” one woman wrote. “This will make it so much harder to reach any kind of bipartisan compromise and create real change.”
The numbers reflect this split in attitude. More than half of female millennials—61 percent—said they’re at least satisfied with the midterm results. Among millennial women who voted, that satisfaction is relatively bipartisan: 48 percent who voted for Democrats said they’re satisfied with results, and 57 percent who voted for Republicans said the same. (“I’m glad Democrats took the House, because even though I’m a registered Republican, I think it’s time for the Republicans (Trump) to have to compromise a little,” wrote one Skimm respondent. “I always think it’s good for the party that the president isn’t a member of to have at least some control in Congress.”) Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the outcome of the election, young women who voted Democratic were almost three times as likely to say they were “excited” by the results (14 percent versus 5 percent of women who voted Republican). Yet the majority harbor doubts regarding the prospects of the next Congress. Fifty-seven percent of millennial women overall believe last week’s election will do more to divide the country than to unite it.
While millennial women disagree about the future, our results suggest they hold certain opinions in common. For instance, almost three-quarters—74 percent—of female millennials voted for the Democratic candidate, while 25 percent voted Republican. (The numbers were less pronounced among male millennials, 56 percent of whom voted for a Democrat.) Of the female millennials who voted blue, 66 percent said they did so to support the specific candidate in their race, but nearly a third—32 percent—said they did so specifically to oppose Trump. Just 24 percent of female millennials who voted Republican said they did so to express their support for the president, who remains as unpopular as ever among the demographic: 75 percent of young women disapprove of how Trump is handling his job as president. (Their male counterparts also disapprove of Trump, but his disapproval rating among young men has fallen from 63 to 56 percent over the course of 2018.) Twenty-four percent of millennial women voters said health care was the most important issue in terms of their vote, while 22 percent cited jobs and the economy, slightly lower than the rest of voters across the country. Talk of the Central American migrant caravan dominated airwaves before the election, and 72 percent of female millennial voters saw the coverage as a distraction from other, more important issues.
In general, millennial women seem enthusiastic about having participated in the democratic process. A significant majority (70 percent) said they voted, half of whom said it was their first time participating in a midterm. Despite the general cynicism of the American electorate, 86 percent said they felt their vote made a difference. Almost 90 percent of female millennials said they felt informed about the issues and candidates presented on the ballot, and 71 percent of female millennials overall said they plan to continue their involvement in politics over the next 12 months by voting. (Only 14 percent said they don’t plan on being active in politics in any capacity over the next year.) In spite of massive voter-registration efforts in advance of the midterms, however, 25 percent of female millennials who didn’t vote said they couldn’t because they weren’t registered, and 19 percent said they didn’t feel informed about the ballot.
In our year of coverage, we have examined how millennial women feel about immigration, Robert Mueller’s probe, gender inequality at work, and the Supreme Court, following the appointment of Brett Kavanaugh. What we found was a more diverse and complicated voting bloc than we had perhaps anticipated. Even along partisan lines, female millennials are far more likely than their male counterparts to support immigration and disapprove of Trump’s handling of the issue. They’re relatively tuned out when it comes to potential collusion with Russia, and many still don’t feel empowered to elevate themselves or their concerns at work because they recognize the systemic barriers created by sexism. For many, Kavanaugh’s confirmation proved to be a sticking point, potentially denting the court’s favorability, and causing a permanent shift in public opinion. These conclusions are by no means stagnant. But they do suggest that young women are uniquely positioned to turn the tide of public discourse in the years to come.
Methodology: This SurveyMonkey online poll was conducted November 7-12, 2018, among a national sample of 5,470 adults, including 632 female millennials. Respondents for this survey were selected from the nearly 3 million people who take surveys on the SurveyMonkey platform each day. The modeled error estimate for this survey is plus or minus 2 percentage points. Data have been weighted for age, race, sex, education, and geography using the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to reflect the demographic composition of the United States age 18 and over. The full breakdown by demographics is available here.