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By Sam Stevenson
Associate News Editor
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President Donald Trump’s standing with women has deteriorated as voters prepare to decide control of Congress in November, according to national polling data.
Key Points
- Trump’s net approval among female voters fell from minus 16 in June to minus 30 in August in ActiVote’s monthly polling.
- Bellwether Research and Consulting separately found that 32 percent of women approved of his performance, while one-quarter of women who voted for him disapproved.
- Bellwether president Christine Matthews told Newsweek that less committed Republicans and independents who backed Trump over inflation and living costs are among those moving away.
- Women identified the economy and cost of living as their leading concern in Bellwether’s survey, presenting Republicans with an affordability challenge before the midterms.
- Matthews said dissatisfaction with the president could reduce support for Republican congressional candidates because voters associate them with his agenda.
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What To Know
Trump’s net approval among women fell 14 points from June to August, with his approval dropping to 34 percent as disapproval reached 64 percent in ActiVote’s latest poll.
That decline matters because women are a large part of the midterm electorate, and separate polling indicates that dissatisfaction extends into groups Republicans carried in recent elections.
GOP candidates must persuade women that the administration is improving household finances while Democrats seek to turn frustration over living costs into votes.
Matthews, a pollster at Bellwether Research and Consulting who has worked for Republican clients, told Newsweek that women moving away from Trump include independents, Republican-leaning women and those who supported him in 2024 because of inflation and the cost of living.
“[They] voted for him in ’24 for precisely the same reasons they are upset with him now,” Matthews said.
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Why It Matters
Midterm elections often test whether a president’s supporters remain motivated once control of Congress is at stake. Matthews said Democratic women are showing greater enthusiasm about voting than Republican women, potentially altering the usual turnout dynamic in which younger, unmarried voters are harder for Democrats to mobilize.
Trump Falls Further Underwater
ActiVote’s monthly presidential approval tracker shows a clear deterioration in Trump’s standing among female voters over three successive surveys.
In June, 41 percent of women approved of his performance and 57 percent disapproved, producing a net rating of minus 16. The poll was published July 2 after collecting responses from 478 registered voters between June 1 and June 30, with a median field date of June 16 and an average expected error of 4.5 percentage points.
July’s numbers moved further against him. Approval stood at 38 percent and disapproval at 57 percent, leaving Trump at minus 19 with women.
ActiVote surveyed 767 registered voters from July 1 through July 31 and published the results August 2.
Its median field date was July 16, and its average expected error was 3.5 percentage points.
The latest poll, published September 1, placed Trump at 34 percent approval and 64 percent disapproval among women.
That survey questioned 1,000 registered voters between August 1 and August 31, with a median field date of August 16 and an average expected error of 3.5 percentage points.
ActiVote uses that term rather than reporting a conventional margin of error.
Subgroup estimates normally carry greater uncertainty than results based on a poll’s full sample. Even so, the movement across all three ActiVote surveys is consistently negative.
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Another Poll Finds Similar Weakness
Bellwether’s independent national survey provides a second warning for the president. Conducted on August 21 and 22, it questioned 1,604 women aged 18 and over, including 1,291 registered voters, and had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points, Matthews confirmed to Newsweek.
Trump’s approval among women stood at 32 percent, according to the survey, while one in four women who voted for him said they now disapprove of his job performance.
Economy and cost of living were the leading issues for 38 percent of respondents.
Matthews said the discontent was “two-fold,” reflecting both immediate pressure from grocery and gasoline prices and women’s judgments about administration policy.
She identified tariffs and the war with Iran as contributing factors, adding that some voters believe Trump has not fulfilled his promise to lower living costs.
“It has increased under his watch and he can no longer blame Biden for it,” Matthews told Newsweek.
Her interpretation is an analysis of the survey rather than proof that any one policy caused Trump’s rating. Bellwether’s findings nevertheless show that women’s leading concern overlaps with the issue on which some former supporters are now faulting him.
An Emerson College Polling survey conducted August 16 and 17 provides further evidence of the divide.
Women disapproved of Trump’s performance by 62 percent to 32 percent, a 30-point gap, while men were evenly divided.
The national survey covered 1,000 likely voters and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points, although Emerson cautioned that demographic subgroups carry larger intervals.
Congressional Republicans Face A Turnout Risk
Bellwether found Democrats leading among white women by 47 percent to 39 percent after Republican House candidates carried that group by 55 percent to 44 percent in 2024.
Democrats and Republicans were tied among married women, a group the GOP won by 13 points in the previous House election.
Matthews told Newsweek that Democratic women were more motivated to participate in the midterms than their Republican counterparts.
“The dissatisfaction with Trump is likely to play an outsize role in suppressing support for Republican congressional candidates because voters see that they are in lock-step with their president,” she said.
“A member of Congress who is a Republican cannot credibly say that they represent something different than the Trump agenda.”
Republican Representative Kat Cammack of Florida also acknowledged the pressure, telling Politico that women were asking the party to help with the cost of living, saying “women are telling us their top concern is affordability, and they’re going to back whoever actually delivers on it.”
“Nobody owes us their vote,” Cammack said. “We earn it with results or we don’t earn it at all.”
What The White House Says
The White House defended Trump’s record by pointing to the administration’s economic agenda rather than addressing the movement among women directly.
“No other President in history has accomplished more for the American people than President Trump, who is working tirelessly to create jobs, cool inflation, increase housing affordability, and more,” spokesman Davis Ingle told Newsweek.
“The President has already made historic progress not only in America but around the world, and this is just the beginning as his agenda continues taking effect.”
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