The RNC in Milwaukee is largely led by women. Will the convention messaging help Republicans?
When the Republican National Convention goes live on July 15, it will be predominately women who brought the four-day made-for-TV event to fruition.
Women top the list of lead RNC organizers, and 31 of the 39 staff members who make up the committee charged with organizing the convention are women.
Polling suggests Republican former President Donald Trump faces an uphill climb with Wisconsin women voters, an important demographic in what is expected to be a close rematch between Trump and Democratic President Joe Biden.
Combining three Marquette Law School polls in Wisconsin conducted over the past year, Republicans enjoy a 13-point edge in party identification with men but Democrats enjoy a 12-point edge with women. Republicans point to national polling indicating negative approval numbers for Biden among women.
The convention organizers said there was no political message in choosing women to lead and staff the committee organizing the RNC known as the Committee on Arrangements, but said women's influence would be felt in the issues raised at the July 15-18 event that will be broadcast across the nation from downtown Milwaukee.
On that list: "Kitchen table issues" like inflation, public safety, U.S. border security and education.
"Every convention is unique and is tailored to the time, and we are at a very pivotal time, I think, in this country," said Lara Trump, co-chair of the Republican National Committee and daughter-in-law of the former president. "And I think having an equal footing and an equal seat at the table is important, and I think that's something that we want to reflect at the RNC and something we plan to reflect, of course, in this convention."
Officials with the Democratic National Convention accused Republicans of using representation as a talking point as opposed to holding it as a party value. They said three Black women are serving in lead roles with the DNC and its host committee and also noted Democratic women who are the first to hold their positions, including Vice President Kamala Harris.
More: Women who had life-changing experiences with abortion laws to campaign in Wisconsin for Biden
It remains to be seen how female voters will weigh issues Republicans raise against Trump's polarizing history with women and his central role during his first term in the overturning of a constitutional right to abortion, a decision that remains in the national discourse as state courts, lawmakers and voters battle over what restrictions to place on access to the procedure.
"Women have been a powerful force in elections and in close, close elections their votes can determine the outcome," said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics. "So, you will see both sides really working hard to energize and activate those women voters and doing pretty much everything they can to turn them out and to get them to vote on their behalf."
And while women are not monolithic as a voting group, since 1980 there has been a gender gap in which women as a whole are more likely than men to support Democratic candidates over Republicans, Walsh said.
The economy is an important driving force for voters regardless of gender, she said, adding that she expected Republicans to continue hammering Biden on the issue of immigration while Democrats would focus on women's reproductive health.
Democrats are taking aim at suburban women, with Vice President Kamala Harris and U.S. Sen Tammy Baldwin making early campaign stops in the biggest suburban prize, Waukesha County.
Trump has focused his coalition largely in rural areas of the state instead of the Republicans' pre-2016 playbook that leaned heavily on the suburban counties.
Influence of women to be felt in issues raised at Republican National Convention, organizers say
One of the lead organizers, Elise Dickens, said she expected "renewed focus on some kitchen-table type issues."
"I think what you'll see from speakers and leaders from our party across the board are politically the issues that really matter to women, who are heads of their household, who are paying their grocery bills, ... who are worried about their kids' education or worried about childcare, worried about all sorts of things, public safety," said Dickens, the chief executive officer for the Committee on Arrangements.
The women hired to run the RNC "have their finger on the pulse of what's happening in this country," said Anne Hathaway, Committee on Arrangements chairwoman.
"This convention's going to energize our base but it will also connect with young mothers, female small business owners," Hathaway said. "Safety, security are big deals for us."
Many of the women on the team are already accomplished within the political realm, and their leadership roles at the convention will take them to the next level, said Hathaway, who leads the Richard G. Lugar Excellence in Public Service Series that seeks to expand the number of Republican women in public service.
Women, she said, are "great listeners and they're good at the details."
"Not that men aren't, but I think we see things through a different lens and bring a great perspective, which puts us in the position to have just an amazing convention," she said.
Lara Trump said the convention would compare Donald Trump's 2016-2020 term in office to Biden's, which began when he unseated Trump in the 2020 election.
"A lot of the things that are very upsetting to see going on in this country right now are really, specifically, impacting our mothers, our families, our children right now," she said. "And, so, I think that will be highlighted as well in this convention. I think there will be a stark contrast and an ability to contrast two presidents, which we have a very unique opportunity to do here."
She highlighted immigration, one of Republicans' leading wedge issues and one on which Biden has moved to the right after record daily border crossings.
Senate Republicans in February blocked a bipartisan border package after months of negotiation, following Trump's announced opposition to the legislation.
Donald Trump, expected Republican nominee, navigating politically delicate issue of abortion
Ultimately, the star of the show will be Trump, a man with a polarizing history with women and reproductive rights.
Both continue to make news.
In May, a federal jury found Trump liable in a civil case for sexual abuse and defamation of advice columnist E. Jean Carroll in 1996 and determined he should pay $5 million in damages. Following the verdict, Trump said on his Truth Social website that he has "no idea" who she is, according to USA TODAY. He has appealed.
Then in January, a federal civil jury said he must pay Carroll $83.3 million for defaming her in 2019, when he denied her allegations of sexual assault. On Truth Social, he said he disagreed with the verdicts and called them a "Biden Directed Witch Hunt focused on me and the Republican Party," according to USA TODAY.
Trump is also indelibly tied to the politically delicate issue of abortion, having made a point in his first term of nominating three U.S. Supreme Court justices who in 2022 helped overturn the landmark Roe V. Wade decision that had for decades guaranteed a constitutional right to abortion.
Since then, abortion has been a key issue across the nation as states, including in Wisconsin, have battled over everything from constitutional amendments to 1800s-era laws that were resurrected after Roe fell.
The Supreme Court decision played a key role in the 2022 midterm elections.
That abortion continues to be a crucial issue in 2024 was clear in the video statement Trump published this month in which he "proudly" took credit for his role in overturning Roe even as he said individual states should choose their own abortion restrictions and avoided talking about any kind of federal government ban. His comments angered both Democrats and anti-abortion Republicans.
“President Trump could not have been more clear," Trump campaign National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. "These are decisions for people of each state to make."
Emily Soong, a spokesperson for the Democratic National Convention, in a statement slammed Trump.
"President Biden and Democrats are fighting to protect women’s reproductive rights while Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans are turning back the clock on freedom," she said. "No matter who Republicans place at the helm of their convention, it will be abundantly clear in July that the GOP doesn’t care about women’s issues – and at the DNC in August, we’ll bring that split screen directly to the American people."
Both parties are looking to win over independent women, though Republicans are in a difficult spot with the white, suburban women who may have been a more reliably moderate Republican vote in the past, Walsh said.
"They have shifted a bit more to be independent in part because of Donald Trump," she said. "His positions on issues, his personal style, his attitude toward women, his behavior I think has driven some of those women away."
The abortion issue has put that front and center for those who are moderately pro-choice and the "draconian" legislation coming out of states may be a bridge too far, she said.
Alison Dirr can be reached at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee's RNC is women-led. What that means for the convention.
