When Push Comes to Shove: An Experimental Analysis of Voter Support of a Woman President and the 2024 Nomination

• Published date: 01 July 2024
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/1532673X241253256
• Author: Meagan Tadevich,Ashley C. F. Hutson,Gregory Shufeldt
• Date: 01 July 2024

Article

American Politics Research

2024, Vol. 52(4) 414–431

© The Author(s) 2024

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DOI: 10.1177/1532673X241253256

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When Push Comes to Shove: An Experimental

Analysis of Voter Support of a Woman

President and the 2024 Nomination

Meagan Tadevich

1

, Ashley C. F. Hutson

2

, and Gregory Shufeldt

3

Abstract

A woman has not yet shattered the “hardest, highest glass ceiling”of the American presidency. Our research answers two

questions: Which groups are more likely to believe electing a woman president to be historically important?(R

1

), and When a

presidential election is at stake, who is likely to support a woman candidate? (R

2

). Using observational data (n= 1075), our

f‌indings indicate that women, people who recognize sexism within politics, Democrats, and liberals are more likely to view a

woman president as historic. Utilizing a list experiment of hypothetical 2024 presidential matchups, few who claimed to view a

woman president as historic were willing to cast a vote in their favor. When push came to shove, Dem ocratic women were the

group most likely to vote for a woman presidential candidate. As parties look toward the future, this study offers insight into

how voters respond to potential nominees and who parties will nominate.

Keywords

women, public opinion, voting behavior, nominations

Introduction

Congress currently has the most women representatives in

history, with 25 women in the Senate and 126 women in the

House of Representatives (Center for American Women and

Politics, 2024b). The 2022 midterm set a precedent when the

number of states electing a woman governor reached double

digits for the f‌irst time, with eight of the 12 women governors-

elect aff‌iliated with the Democratic party (Center for

American Women and Politics, 2022;Hutson et al., 2022).

Some view this increased representation as emblematic of

social progress. Yet, women constitute the majority gender in

the United States, and this majority is not ref‌lected in the

demographics of political leadership (U.S. Census Bureau,

2022). The recency of multiple women competing for the

2020 Democratic nominee suggests that this lack of repre-

sentation may not be entirely attributable to a lack of viable

candidates for off‌ice—problems with the political pipeline,

sexism, partisanship and political ideology may also con-

tribute to a lack of descriptive representation in American

government.

The 2020 f‌ield of Democratic candidates included the

most diverse pool of candidates in American history with

several prominent, viable women candidates, including

Senators Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar,

Elizabeth Warren, and Representative Tulsi Gabbard.

Ultimately, then-former Vice President Joseph Biden, a man,

secured the Democratic nomination and ascended to the

Presidency. Senator Kamala Harris made history as the f‌irst

woman elected Vice-President, and she brief‌ly served as

acting president when President Biden underwent a proce-

dure requiring general anesthesia (Sonmez, 2021). On the

Republican side of the aisle, Former UN Ambassador Nikki

Haley emerged as the most viable alternative to former

President Trump in 2024 before ultimately dropping out of

the race after a disappointing Super Tuesday (McCormick,

2024). Although both parties have had the option to select

among viable women candidates, a woman has not yet been

elected president of the United States of America. Do

American voters want a woman president? If so, are they

willing to vote for one?

Public opinion demonstrates a preference for descriptive

representation, the concept used to describe a desire to elect

1

Indiana University, Indianapolis, IN, USA

2

Butler University, Indianapolis, IN, USA

3

University of Indianapolis, Indianapolis, IN, USA

Corresponding Author:

Ashley C. F. Hutson, Department of Sociology & Criminology, Butler

University, 4600 Sunset Avenue, Indianapolis, IN 46227, USA.

Email: afeely@butler.edu

off‌icials who share similar demographic characteristics and/

or experiences with those they represent (e.g., Bratton, 2002;

Bratton & Haynie, 1999;Haider-Markel, 2007;Mansbridge,

1999). In Sanbonmatsu and Dolan’s study (2009), the general

public expressed a preference for more women to be elected

to public off‌ice, with the modal “ideal”response being that

half of representatives should be women. Public opinion also

demonstrates a belief that descriptive representation is pos-

sible: according to a January 2020 Gallup poll, the over-

whelming majority (93%) of respondents believed that a well-

qualif‌ied woman could be elected president (Saad, 2020). In

Reinhart’s (2021) study, 93% of respondents believed that a

woman could lead the country in the next decade. Such

research suggests that most of the public supports descriptive

representation, believes that descriptive representation is

possible, and believes descriptive representation may be

achieved in the United States within the next decade

(Reinhart, 2021;Saad, 2020;Sanbonmatsu & Dolan, 2009).

Our study begins with a central premise: elected off‌icials

remain overwhelmingly men, despite the public’s support of

descriptive representation and the presence of viable women

candidates. Using observational and experimental techniques

via a questionnaire distributed to 1075 participants, our study

investigates the circumstances related to voters’beliefs and

potential support of a woman candidate in presidential

primaries.

Our study aims to answer two questions. Our f‌irst research

question is, Which groups are more likely to believe electing a

woman as president to be historically important? (R

1

). We

use the phrase “historically important”in our f‌irst research

question to gauge participants’support for a woman president

in the abstract, when little is at stake. We f‌ind that people who

hold more equitable views of women (“feminists”),

1

people

who identify as women (“women”), Democrats, and political

liberals are more likely to believe electing a woman president

to be historically important.

2

Our second research question is,

When a presidential election is at stake, which groups are

more likely to support a woman candidate? (R

2

). In order to

answer our second research question, we prospectively, rather

than retrospectively, assess whether proponents of a woman

executive supported actual women candidates in potential

2024 nomination contests using an original list experiment.

Our research demonstrates that voters who perceive

women to have been excluded from political leadership are

more likely to support a woman candidate when push comes

to shove. Our study also presents clear evidence of party

asymmetry: Democrats prioritize solidarity with group

identity while Republicans are more likely to make ideo-

logical decisions (Freeman, 1986;Grossman & Hopkins,

2016;Shufeldt, 2018). Although most voters are unwilling

to vote for a woman when push to shove, there are differences

between Democratic and Republican voters. Democratic

women are more likely to prioritize the election of the f‌irst

woman executive. Among Republicans, gender identity is not

associated with voting for a woman candidate, but those that

believe electing the f‌irst woman president to be historically

important are more likely to vote for a woman.

Our study builds on previous research by examining how

support for a woman president translates (or fails to translate)

into tangible support through voting. Considering that much

of this research has focused on women’s candidacies for

lower public off‌ice, our f‌indings are particularly important for

political parties ahead of the next presidential election. De-

spite the increased number of women candidates in the

2020 presidential primaries and Nikki Haley’s proximity to

winning the nomination in 2024, it is likely that the United

States will not see its f‌irst woman president until additional

steps are taken to cultivate and support women candidates in

the political pipeline, correct for sexist attitudes and be-

haviors, and account for partisan ideologies that relate to

electing women to the highest off‌ice. It is our hope that

f‌indings from this study help political parties and candidates

better understand how to break this highest, hardest glass

ceiling, if not in 2024, then in elections to come.

Past and Present Research

Only 24 women have run for president during the nearly two

and a half centuries of American history (Center for American

Women in Politics, 2023b).

3

For this reason, much of the

existing research in this area focuses on elections for lower

levels of public off‌ice. As such, discourses regarding the

underrepresentation of women in politics are often framed as

an imbalance in the supply and demand of women candidates

(e.g., Jalalzai, 2013;Lovenduski, 2016;Sanbonmatsu, 2006).

Although our study focuses on the demand-side of women’s

candidacies in presidential primaries, one cannot be under-

stood without the other. Therefore, we apply a broad supply

and demand framework in examining problems with the

political pipeline, explanations regarding sexism in political

behavior, as well as the role of partisanship and political

ideology. In this section, we offer four hypotheses regarding

the groups we expect to be most likely to view the election of

the f‌irst woman president as historically important, and one

hypothesis regarding who is most likely to actually vote for a

woman candidate when push comes to shove.

Women Candidates’Supply in the Political Pipeline

When women run for off‌ice, they win at similar rates as men

(Burrell, 1996). But f‌irst, they must run. There are a variety of

reasons why women do not run for off‌ice but, in general,

women are disadvantaged in three key areas: political am-

bition, role models, and professional experience. With a focus

on supplying viable women candidates to voters for con-

sideration, political pipeline theory asserts that a woman’s

professional experience in lower public off‌ice will better

position her as a candidate for higher public off‌ice, partic-

ularly if she holds “high-prestige, ‘masculine’posts, such as

minister of justice or attorney general”(Mariani, 2008;

Tadevich et al.415