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 The loud-mouthed real estate mogul, who holds a wide lead over
rivals in the Republican race for the White House, has been
unapologetic, despite pundits saying his clash with Kelly could hurt
him with women voters and halt his meteoric rise in the polls.
A new Reuters/Ipsos poll suggests Trump - who has dominated coverage
of the 2016 election with a series of flame-throwing comments about
illegal Mexican immigrants, the war record of Senator John McCain
and Kelly - may in fact still be leading among women Republican
supporters.
There's evidence of that support in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania,
even though the county leans Democrat. A third of women randomly
interviewed by Reuters on the street self-identified as Trump
supporters and said they still supported him.
Kelly Ray, 34, a former teacher and conservative Christian who left
work to home-school her two children, said Trump was an attractive
candidate because he was an outsider who had not held elected
office.
 "I like how disgusted he is in how things are right now," she said
outside a Kohls department store in Trexlertown on Monday. "I'm not
fed up with Donald Trump. I'm fed up with (U.S. President) Barack
Obama."
She said she was not put off by Trump's performance in last week's
Republican presidential debate. Trump bristled when Kelly, one of
the moderators, said he had called women "fat pigs, dogs, slobs and
disgusting animals" in the past.
Trump accused her of political correctness and of not treating him
with respect. In a CNN interview on Friday he said of Kelly: "You
could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out
of her - wherever."
That comment was seen as implying she had been menstruating during
the debate, although Trump has repeatedly denied this and said he
had been referring to her nose.
"A LITTLE ROUGH AROUND THE EDGES"
"Shame on the public for presuming something, for putting words in
his mouth," said Evonne Groody, 28, a nurse in Allentown,
Pennsylvania.
Groody said Trump was her first choice for president even though
she's a registered Democrat.
"Women are not offended by that at all," said Lori Pesta, creator of
Facebook group Women for Donald Trump, referring to Trump's comment
about Kelly. The page, which has more than 600 "likes", was launched
just days before the latest controversy erupted.
"It doesn’t matter what Donald Trump says. The news media is going
to twist it. I heard the original comment and it shouldn’t have been
taken that way," she said.
Trump's outspokenness is his most important quality, according to
the women who like him. Women interviewed in Lehigh County and
respondents in a Reuters/Ipsos poll praised his apparent honesty.
"He's a little rough around the edges because he goes against the
grain," said Angie Brodie, 38, another nurse in Allentown.
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To be sure, many of the women interviewed were vehemently opposed to
Trump's behavior. And the Reuters/Ipsos poll, conducted between Aug.
7 and Aug. 11, appeared to show female support for Trump waning
slightly, falling to 20 percent from 26 percent on Aug. 3. The poll
had a credibility interval of 7.1 percentage points.
Trump's comment about Kelly cost him at least one supporter: Renee
Daily, 56, a grandmother in Trexlertown who said his candidacy had
inspired her to register to vote for the first time in her life. On
Monday she said she had given up on him.
"He just started to talk too much," she said.
To win the presidency, Trump needs strong backing from women, who
make up 53 percent of the U.S. electorate. At the moment, he has a
wider leader among men than women.
BIG MOUTH
Paradoxically, media attention to Trump's comments about Kelly may
be helping him shore up support.
Of the 17 Republican presidential hopefuls, Trump is arguably the
most spontaneous speaker. "What I say is what I say," he told Kelly
in response to her question on women during the debate.
Spontaneity is an advantage, said Davida Charney, a rhetoric and
writing professor at the University of Texas at Austin.
"Something that is unplanned and critical is somehow truer, more
honest," she said.
That's how Groody saw it. She said Trump seemed so straightforward
that if he had wanted to say Kelly was irrational because she was
menstruating, he would have just said it plainly.
But some fans worry his unfiltered style could cross a line.
Susan Wetzel, 55, a former shipping company worker living in a
Dallas suburb, said she cared more about the problems Trump was
addressing, like immigration than about his comments on Kelly, which
she found offensive. She wants Trump to talk more about policy
issues.
"If he doesn't, he's not going to get my vote," she said. "We need a
grown-up in office, we don't need a little kid."
(Reporting By Emily Flitter and Alana Wise, editing by Ross Colvin)
[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]
Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
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