America is more single than ever, and unmarried, college-educated women are fast becoming the dominant voting bloc in US politics.
Educated women and voters of color were primarily responsible for turning the “red wave” into a red trickle in the 2022 midterm elections after the Supreme Court overturned the controversial Roe vs. Wade decision that enshrined a federal abortion right.
“It’s like waking up a sleeping giant,” Shah said of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, which brought Roe v. Wade was lifted. ‘The Democrats spoke directly [unmarried women]. You said the Republicans are trying to take away your autonomy.’
In 2022, according to CNN exit polls, unmarried women voted more than two to one for the Democratic House of Representatives candidates — 68 to 31 percent. According to the National Election Pool Network Consortium (NEP) Exit Poll, 60 percent of voters said they were currently married.
Marital status was also a determining factor for men, but by a much smaller margin — while married men broke for the Republicans at 20 percent, unmarried men favored the GOP at seven percent.
Educated women and voters of color were primarily responsible for turning the “red wave” into a red trickle in the 2022 midterm election after the Supreme Court’s controversial decision to overthrow Roe vs. Wade
Educational levels are critical in this voting bloc, as women now make up the majority of college graduates — a whopping 59 percent. And women of color as a group returned to college in greater numbers than white women and men — in the 2020-21 school year, according to a recent report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
“The college and post-college marriage culture, the decline in marriage rates among college-educated women, and the lack of marriageable men willing to commit are all by-products of a biased gender ratio and a massive undersupply of college-educated men -Diploma. ‘ explains economics author Jon Birger in his book Date-onomics.
Jennifer Lim, strategist and founder of Republican Women for Progress, said the GOP has understood for over a decade that its issues resonate with women, but little has changed.
“Women, especially single women, are one of the most critical demographics that the GOP must focus on in the next presidential election and beyond if the party is to survive,” she told . “Since at least 2012, the GOP has officially understood that it needs to communicate more effectively with women, and it has made little progress since then.”
Without a “cohesive political platform” in a post-Roe world, “Republicans have little to offer this demographic,” Lim says.
In 2022, according to CNN exit polls, unmarried women voted more than two to one for the Democratic House of Representatives candidates — 68 to 31 percent
Women participate in the Woman’s March in New York City
Ariel Hill-Davis, co-founder of GOP Women for Progress, said the Republican Party is too focused on “traditional family values” over anything else to appeal to single women.
“Like many unmarried women, I deal with a variety of issues including business, regulation, manufacturing, reproductive health and civil liberties. I shouldn’t have to choose between access to birth control and lower taxes,” she said.
Like Hill-Davis, Shah said she believes many unmarried women are showing signs of fiscal conservatism but are put off by the party’s stance on reproductive issues and Trump.
If they see Trump 2025 at the top of the ticket, Shah said, “that would be the nail in the coffin.”
In stark contrast, Karoline Leavitt, the Generation Z candidate who won a GOP primary for New Hampshire’s first congressional district but lost in the general election to Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas, believes her party should be doing the opposite – moving in the culture wars are tumbling and fighting back against a left that she says intends to “break up family unity and weaken traditional gender roles.”
“As an unmarried Gen Z woman, I see the constant cultural pressure on women my age to reject traditional, conservative women’s roles of wife, mother, and housewife and embrace progressive, ‘feminist’ ideals, which means hating manly men, abortions instead of babies to have and to focus on a career instead of family,” she told .
As young people postpone marriages, the voting bloc for single women continues to grow
The number of unmarried women has increased from 20 percent in 1950 to over 30 percent in 2022.
At the same time, the proportion of women currently married has fallen from 70 percent in 1950 to less than 50 percent today.
While most voters are still married, young people are marrying later, if at all.
According to 2021 General Social Survey data, just 15 percent of 18-29-year-old women were married, half the number in 2000.
Dornan says, “If Republicans continue to insist on these extreme positions on abortion, we’re never going to get those voters.”
“Women pay taxes like everyone else, and eventually they will get tired of paying high taxes, especially when they start making more money,” he added. “And so if we can get the message across and move away from the cultural issues, then I think maybe at some point we could try to bring them into our coalition.” But until then, I believe, there is no prayer.”
Concerns about declining birth rates around the world are growing – one in six women in the US will now be 45 without ever having children, up from 1 in 10 in 1990.
Those who do not plan to have children see fewer reasons to get married – the proportion of married households without children has fallen from 37 percent in 1976 to 21 percent in 2022.
But many seem less likely to partner up at all than in years past — a 2019 study by Pew Research found that single-person households in the United States have grown from 13 percent to 27 percent since 1960.
Now, these young and often unattached women are more ethnically diverse, less conventionally religious, and more educated than ever.
The kicker tries to collect such a base without eliminating the right wing of the party.
“Republicans have to be very careful about how they address their messages to attract this demographic because they don’t want to go too far and alienate their base,” GOP strategist John Feehery told .