Eliminating the widening gender gap dividing Generation Z: From the Policy Desk

Welcome to the online version From the Politics DeskAn evening newsletter from the NBC News Politics team bringing you the latest reporting and analysis from the campaign trail, the White House and Capitol Hill.

In today’s issue, we break down our latest survey of how Gen Z voters are viewing the presidential race in recent days. Additionally, national political correspondent Ben Kamisar looks at the boom in foreign spending this election cycle. Veteran political correspondent Jonathan Allen explains what the location of Kamala Harris’ closing remarks revealed.

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Gen Z gender gap: Women give Harris an advantage, men are divided

Written by: Stephanie Perry, Marc Trussler and Mara Haeger

According to the latest data, half of registered voters under the age of 30 plan to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris, and a third are siding with former President Donald Trump. Stay Tuned on NBC News Gen Z Survey powered by SurveyMonkey.

Among young voters who say they will vote in November’s presidential election, Harris has a 20-point lead, 56%-36%. The turn of some younger voters toward candidates other than Harris and Trump falls well short of the 24-point lead President Joe Biden had among voters under 30 in 2020 (60%-36%), according to an NBC News exit poll. .

However, there are notable divisions between different groups within Generation Z, and the gender gap is particularly significant.

Young women said they would vote for Harris over Trump by 33 points. The junior men were actually tied, with Harris leading by 2 points.

Men (46%) were more likely than women (30%) to say Trump has the right temperament to serve as president. Correspondingly, women (65%) were more likely than men (55%) to say Harris had the right temperament.

Gender differences appear on the issues young voters say are most important to their vote. Although inflation and the cost of living were seen as the most important issues among both men (35%) and women (29%), differing views emerged on what to do next; While 13% of women chose abortion, 4% of men chose abortion. While 13% of men state threats to democracy as their most important problem, the rate of women choosing this issue is 9%.

There were also large gender differences in the role abortion policy would play in candidate selection. Just under half (48%) of young women say they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion, compared to 36% of men.

Read the rest of the survey →

More tricks: A. national CNBC poll Among all registered voters, Trump has 48 percent to Harris’ 46 percent; This is a 2 point difference, within the margin of error.

Foreign expenditures in the presidential race surpassed 1 billion dollars, breaking a new record

By Ben Kamisar

NBC News analysis found that outside groups have poured a staggering $1.1 billion into the presidential race with less than two weeks until Election Day, surpassing the record set in the 2020 election.

That figure includes spending by super PACs and other groups not directly affiliated with candidates’ campaigns and party committees during the primary and general election campaigns.

To put the current level of foreign spending into perspective, the figure above $1 billion is gross domestic product of more than a dozen countries.

This frantic pace is well ahead of where things were already four years ago, when independent spending stood at more than $910 million as of Oct. 24. More than $1 billion was spent in total in the 2020 presidential contest.

Kamala Harris, whose presidential bid is just months away after an unprecedented summer shift at the top of the Democratic ticket became the subject more than two-thirds of total foreign spending this cycle.

What does Harris’ closing argument address reveal?

by Jonathan Allen

Whatever Kamala Harris says in her closing remarks to the nation on Tuesday, it will send the message that Donald Trump is unfit for the office they both seek.

His chosen location, the Ellipse at the foot of the White House, is where Trump gathered his supporters on January 6, 2021, and urged them to march to the Capitol. In a small dining room next to the Oval Office, he watched silently as a mob ransacked the Capitol in a vain attempt to overturn his defeat.

Since then, Democrats have grappled with tension between their core belief that voters should reject Trump because they conclude he is an existential threat to the republic, and polls that show many voters are focused on more tactile issues like abortion, inflation and immigration.

Some voters feel they don’t know enough about what Harris will do on key policy questions. It’s a double-edged sword, because it means he hasn’t finalized the deal with less than two weeks until Election Day, but at least in theory he has room to do so. And yet it’s unclear whether he can do anything to please those voters.

Harris will likely give them a final push aimed at crossing the “t’s” and dotting the “i’s” in her agenda; This will be a move to convert recently undecided voters with a positive message about their policy plans. But by simply choosing his venue, he is trying to strengthen his base and turn undecided voters against Trump.

While Harris’ popularity soared in the weeks after she took the reins of the Democratic Party, she moved away from the democracy cause argument that was central to Joe Biden’s platform. Now, he’s returning to that as he goes head-to-head with Trump.

If she wins, the conversation about the Ellipse will undoubtedly feature prominently in coverage of Harris’ unexpected and historic victory at a moment when she rises to the opportunity to defend democracy. If he loses, it could be seen as a last-miss opportunity to focus on issues that more directly affect voters’ daily lives.

Closing time: Harris is also enlisting some of the Democratic Party’s biggest stars to help her make her closing argument. Monica Alba, Carol E. Lee and Yamiche Alcindor report It was stated that Harris will appear on stage with former President Barack Obama in Georgia on Thursday and with former First Lady Michelle Obama in Michigan on Saturday, and will campaign with the Obamas for the first time during this period.

But one prominent Democrat Harris has yet to enlist is Hillary Clinton. The decision underscores that Harris, in her speech to voters, did not emphasize the history-making potential of her candidacy; This is in stark contrast to Clinton’s approach in the 2016 campaign. Written by Monica Alba, Yamiche Alcindor and Gary Grumbach.

As for Trump, his campaign is focusing on immigration, inflation and foreign policy in the final days of the race. But as Note by Jonathan Allen and Katherine DoyleTrump himself has been stepping up personal attacks against Harris.

Today’s featured stories

Harris is on the way: At a CNN town hall in Pennsylvania, Harris called Trump a “fascist” for making it louder to voters that he was unfit for office. Read more →
Trump is on leave: Trump’s team is pushing him to embrace town hall-style events as they try to narrow the gender gap, many of which are held by women. Read more →
Trump is on leave, more: Trump has said that if elected, he would fire special prosecutor Jack Smith “within two seconds” after he is sworn in. Read more →
2025 vision: Harris’ team has been quietly evaluating potential candidates who could run for attorney general if she wins. Read more →
WOW: Waukesha, Wisconsin mayor Shawn Reilly, a former Republican, announced his support for Harris. The city is part of the WOW suburban counties (Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington) around Milwaukee that have long been a GOP stronghold, but Democrats have made some recent gains. Read more →
Keys to the Keystone State: NBC News Decision Desk breaks down how Democrats’ voter registration advantage is shrinking in Pennsylvania and what that could mean for the election. Read more →
Increase the bet: A GOP super PAC is hitting the airwaves in the Nevada Senate race; It’s the group’s first spending in a race where the party’s Senate nominee is trailing Trump in recent polls. Read more →
Texas Hold’em: And in Texas, Democrats’ super PAC is launching a TV ad buy in a last-minute boost to Democratic Rep. Colin Allred in his race against GOP Sen. Ted Cruz. Read more →
In publications: Future Forward, the super PAC of Democrats backing Harris, has been quietly running millions of dollars’ worth of Spanish-language ads aimed at Latino voters. Read more →
Cowboy Carter: Beyoncé will appear alongside Harris at a campaign event in Houston on Friday and is expected to perform. Read more →
Steel Curtain: Former Pittsburgh Steelers players are lining up on opposite sides of a showdown between Harris and Trump in a key battleground state. Read more →

That’s all from the Politics Desk for now. If you have any feedback you like or dislike, email us at: [email protected]

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