Beyond Abortion, the GOP is Still Turning Off Women
1. Battleground PA: What happens when voters learn about GOP candidates’ stance on immigration?
Screenshot of “Dr. Oz Doesn’t Represent Us” ad
Survey says: voters are willing to drop their vote for Republican candidates’ position on immigration.
New proof points. Tests conducted this month by BlueLabs Analytics and Swayable, respectively, found that – much like the GOP’s extremism on abortion – exposing Republican candidates’ extreme, anti-immigrant actions and rhetoric can successfully shut their opponent down and win favorability among critical blocs of voters.
Dr. Oz turns off women… and other key voters
BlueLabs Analytics surveyed swing and persuadable voters in Pennsylvania who were shown both an ad by the Senate Leadership Fund (SLF), attacking Democratic candidate John Fetterman’s record on crime and sanctuary cities, and another ad (Dr. Oz Doesn’t Represent Us) where an Army veteran discusses the importance of immigrants to Pennsylvania and condemns GOP candidate Dr. Oz and his party’s attacks on immigrants.
SLF’s anti-Fetterman ad created a backlash among PA voters. 62% of voters were unconvinced by the ad. More than half were also less likely to vote for Dr. Oz.
The ad against Dr. Oz crystallized support for John Fetterman, with 63% of voters saying they would support the Democratic candidate. The ad also largely increased pro-immigrant sentiment among a majority of Pennsylvania women of all age groups.
Similarly, in a survey conducted by Swayable, Pennsylvania registered voters were shown the Dr. Oz Doesn’t Represent Us ad.
After seeing the ad, 68% of respondents had a negative perception of Dr. Oz. Among Latino respondents, that number jumped from 63% to 72%. Similarly, Independent voters unfavorability went from 62% to 68%.
Women, in particular, who saw the ad against Dr. Oz not only found him more unfavorable, but shifted their votes to Democratic candidate John Fetterman by 4 points (66%).
Mastriano can’t court women either
Swayable tested another ad (Mastriano Doesn’t Represent Our Values) featuring a Pittsburgh teacher reflecting on his own family’s immigrant roots and rejecting Mastriano’s “disgusting” attacks on newer immigrants. 68% of voters, including 65% of Independents, said they would vote for Democratic candidate Josh Shapiro over Mastriano after viewing the ad. Women also shifted their votes for Shapiro by nearly 5 points (68%).
2. Will women buy the GOP’s closing argument?
In the closing weeks, Republicans are making a furious attempt to make the election about crime, immigration, and inflation.
279 political ads, launched from late August, by the top four Republican committees and PACs aligned with congressional leadership (SLF, NRSC, CLF and NRCC) almost exclusively attack Democrats on those three themes:
92 ads employ an attack on crime, criminals or “defund the police,”
33 ads deployed anti-immigrant attacks, and
157 use attacks around inflation and taxes, often entangled with the GOP’s racialized politics.
On crime and immigration, they are running the decades-old Willie-Horton type of racist advertising and border demagoguery that is meant to rile up the MAGA base and distract swing voters from January 6th and the party’s attempt to end abortion rights, including efforts to criminalize the procedure for women and their doctors.
As John Thomas, a Republican strategist told Politico, Republicans have not shifted the American electorate’s consciousness to “illegal immigration.” And warned that the migrant political stunts from Governors Abbott and DeSantis is “not terribly good electoral strategy for the midterms simply because in a lot of these tighter contests, more looking at House races in southern California, places in Arizona and Nevada, it’s mostly college-educated white women that are going to decide this thing.”
3. The border looms large in debates
Debates are on primetime, and so what are candidates talking about? Our team analyzed 68 general election debates from July 29 to Oct 11. The border, crime, and fentanyl dominated. Border was said 429 times; the word crime was said 323 times; and the word fentanyl came up 125 times.
In the debates for the Senate, Republicans continue to push the false attack line about fentanyl, but Democrats bring the facts like John Oliver’s recent takedown.
Senator Mark Kelly (AZ) named the real problem at the border – commercial traffic, not migrants: “how it gets smuggled through ports of entry… Because of the work I have done… every single one of these lanes will have the technology.”
Mike Franken (IA) correctly informed viewers that fentanyl “isn’t being humpbacked by… undocumented people crossing the border, it comes across in traffic and merchandise, in trucks, etc.”
Got a question or request for any messaging research? Email us at info@datatodisrupt.org.
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