Romney’s Greatest Weakness

Mitt Romney has a problem with women: Female voters are frightened by his restrictive positions on contraception and abortion. This pleases Democrats, who see women voters as key to Obama’s re-election. Now Romney is desperately trying to gain the support of women.

Mitt Romney’s problem with women is simple: They would rather vote for Barack Obama. According to a recent survey by the Washington Post and ABC News, Obama leads his Republican opponent by 19 percentage points among women. And a study done by the Gallup organization in conjunction with USA Today shows that in the so-called swing states Obama would win thanks again to women voters. The swing states are crucial because the number of independents who live there will likely be decisive on election eve.

Romney, the dashing entrepreneur, scores better among men, leading Obama by 8 percentage points according again to the Washington Post and ABC News poll. But their votes alone will not be enough to elect Romney in November. And ever since Bill Clinton’s re-election in 1996, American women have voted Democratic. Therefore, according to the U.S. media, liberals are pushing themes of interest to female voters such as education, healthcare and employment equality issues.

That’s why Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act within one week of his inauguration, legislation that made it easier for women to sue on the basis of pay inequality for equal working conditions. Sam Stein, a reporter for the Huffington Post, queried Romney’s campaign team about their candidate’s position on the Lilly Ledbetter Act and after some hesitation got the reply, “Sam,we’ll have to get back to you on that.” After a couple of hours, Romney’s headquarters gave the vague response that Romney “supports pay equity and is not looking to change current law.”

Romney’s restrictive position on the disputed issues of contraception and abortion have also helped make him unpopular with many women. Last week, Romney promised to cut funding for Planned Parenthood if elected. A Planned Parenthood spokesperson responded that Romney wanted to do away with an organization that provided cancer screenings and advisory services to three million women. Democrats were quick to go on the attack, calling Romney’s position a “war on women.”

But his conservative positions on contraception and abortion can’t be the only reason for Romney’s unpopularity with women. After all, at the point at which he withdrew from the nomination race, Rick Santorum had a higher approval rating among women voters than Romney. Journalist Nona Willis Aronowitz argued in Good magazine, “At least we know where Santorum stands. Romney, on the other hand, stands wherever the GOP tells him to.”

Republican election strategists are now desperately looking to convince women voters otherwise. Last week, Romney tried to blame women’s woes on his favorite whipping boy, liberal economic policies: “The real war on women is being waged by the president’s failed economic policies,” he told his audience. To support this, he repeatedly made reference to one specific figure: “Do you know how many women — what percent of the job losses were women? 92.3 percent of the job losses during the Obama years has been women who’ve lost those jobs. The real war on women has been the job losses as a result of the Obama economy,” he claimed. The New York Times made it clear, however, that many male factory workers now particularly endangered by the financial crisis had already lost their jobs prior to Obama’s inauguration. Romney’s followers also claimed that Romney as governor had hired numerous women for high-level positions.

Then Romney’s wife, Ann, got involved in the campaign when Obama supporter Hillary Rosen publicly said that Ann Romney “has actually never worked a day in her life.” That set off a storm of protest among women. President Obama tried to calm the waters by saying, “There’s no tougher job than being a mom.”

Mrs. Romney, housewife and mother of five, is convincing to older women: She has overcome cancer and currently struggles with multiple sclerosis. But the liberal press treats her with malice. Blogger and journalist Bob Cesca published a caricature of Ann Romney bemoaning her fate as a housewife and having to decide which of their many homes they should live in. That struck a nerve. The women to whom Romney needs to appeal are young, nowhere near as wealthy as Ann Romney and are asking what the future holds for them. Planned Parenthood’s judgment: “Mitt Romney’s highest political priority is not women’s health (or even creating jobs): it’s Mitt Romney.”