Democrats hope to recruit female voters after misogynistic Republican comments | US elections 2024

Republicans made a series of offensive and misogynistic comments just five days before the election, fueling Democratic hopes of bringing women out on Election Day in a contest that has put women’s rights at the center of Kamala Harris’ campaign.

With a large gender gap seemingly shaping the election race — women disproportionately breaking for Kamala Harris and men for Donald Trump — both campaigns have sought to shore up their bases in their latest remarks.

On Thursday, the former US president, discussing his claims that the US did not get involved in new foreign conflicts during his administration, criticized former Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney, daughter of George W. Bush’s vice president Dick Cheney, for a “radical war hawk,” and says guns should be pointed at her to “see how she feels about it.”

The violent images from this side against a prominent female politician were just the latest in a series of shady comments from Republicans that the Harris campaign has seized on as evidence that a Trump victory would be a disaster for women’s freedoms.

Trump called Cheney “a very stupid individual” and said: “Let’s put her there with a gun and nine barrels shooting at her, okay? Let’s see what she thinks about it. You know, when the guns are pointed at her face.”

Ian Sams, a senior adviser to Harris’ campaign, called out Trump for “dangerous, violent rhetoric.” “You have Donald Trump, talking about sending a prominent Republican to the firing squad. And you have Vice President Harris talking about sending one to her cabinet,” Sams told MSNBC on Friday.

Meanwhile, Harris described a Trump promise the day before to “protect” women as “deeply insulting” “whether the women like it or not.”

The Democratic campaign also aired a new ad, narrated by Julia Roberts, in which a woman enters a voting booth and apparently secretly votes for Harris. “In the only place in America where women still have the right to choose, you can vote any way you want. And no one will ever know,” the ad says, as the woman takes another knowing look at the voting booths.

When she emerges after voting for Harris, a man asks her if she made “the right choice.” “Yes, darling,” she says with a smile.

Fox News primetime host Jesse Watters responded to the ad, saying on air that if his wife votes for Harris, “that’s like having an affair” and that he would divorce her. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s a violation of the sanctity of our marriage. What else is she keeping from me? What else did she lie about?”

The comment was followed by Charlie Kirk, whose right-wing organization Turning Point Action has played a key role in Trump’s get-out-the-vote efforts. He said the man in the ad is “probably going out of his way to make sure (the woman) goes and has a nice life,” adding, “And she lies to him and says, ‘I’m going to vote for Trump ‘, and then she votes for Kamala Harris as her little secret in the voting booth.”

And pro-Trump pastor Dale Partridge declared Tuesday that “in a Christian marriage, a woman should vote according to her husband’s direction.”

The Trump campaign has tried to hit back, accusing Democrat-supporting billionaire Mark Cuban of putting down female Trump supporters, saying Trump was too “intimidated” to surround himself with “strong, intelligent women.”

Kristi Noem, the Republican governor of South Dakota, directly challenged Cuban. “The game’s on, buddy. I’ll take you into a debate or maybe even arm wrestling every day.

But a promise by Trump on Thursday that he would give Robert F. Kennedy Jr. a prominent role in his administration dealing with “women’s health” drew further criticism.

Trump has tried to sue women with the dubious suggestion that they don’t have to worry about reproductive rights — Trump takes credit for overturning the federal right to abortion — if they have already been killed by a migrant without paper.

“I’m going to protect them from the arrival of migrants,” Trump said. “I am going to protect them from foreign countries that want to hit us with missiles and much more.”

The Harris campaign, meanwhile, hopes his comments are a useful political wedge, coming from a man found liable for sexual assault, with a judge calling a “rape” allegation against Trump “substantially true.”

Another accusation of sexual assault was made against Trump last week by model Stacey Williams, who revealed to the Guardian that Trump, in her own words, groped her in a “twisted game” with convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

Trump’s first presidential campaign was jeopardized by leaked audio in which Trump bragged about sexually assaulting women by grabbing women by their genitals, and he was found guilty of 34 felonies after attempting to silence adult film star Stormy Daniels to buy, unlawfully interfering in the 2016 elections.

“This is the same man who said women should be punished for their choices,” Harris said Thursday at an event in Phoenix.

“He simply does not respect women’s freedom or women’s intelligence to know what is in their own best interests and make decisions accordingly. But We trust women.”