Donald Trump has defeated Kamala Harris for the presidency of the United States in the elections on Tuesday, November 5. He did so with the same number of votes he lost to Joe Biden four years ago, as emphasized by Luisa García, Global Chief Operating Officer (COO) at LLYC. This leads us to question if being a woman had anything to do with the defeat of the Democratic candidate.
García, who also points out that Harris "lost nearly 10 million votes that Biden received," believes that "isolating that phenomenon will be difficult." However, she does highlight the confirmation of "something we knew from other electoral contests: women do not vote for women just because."
In fact, 54% of American women supported the current vice president. "Those who think Trump is a better candidate or prefer to stay home do not vote for Harris just because she is a woman," she insists.
Along the same lines, gender expert Gloria Lomana, founder and director of 50&50 Gender Leadership, believes that in these elections, "the fact that Kamala Harris is a woman did not have a decisive influence. It was a very anti-system, punitive, populist vote."
Lomana also thinks that the vice president made a mistake during the electoral campaign: "She sought the women's vote a lot, and that was a mistake in the sense that she did not open up as much as possible. She lacked that hook that Trump, as a provocateur, possesses."
Aside from the results, is the United States ready to be governed by a woman? This persistent question has been heard for decades and has been refined since last summer when Joe Biden passed the baton to Kamala Harris: Is the country ready for a black female president? Are they willing to see a man, in this case Doug Emhoff, performing traditional host functions as the first gentleman?
Adam Eichen, Jesse Rhodes, and Tatishe Nteta, political scientists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst who conducted a survey on Americans' views on gender and the extent to which sexism still permeates among citizens, discovered that yes, "sexism remains a powerful force in the politics of that country, and the scars of the 2016 campaign, in which this factor played a key role in Hillary Clinton's defeat by Trump, are still open wounds for the Democrats."
The population has once again tilted the balance in favor of men, underscoring the significant gender gap present in 61% of the world's countries that have never been governed by a woman. In the remaining countries, women are gradually taking the lead in the head of state position with relative equality.
It is difficult to understand why the United States lags behind and what is hindering the presence of a woman in the White House. This time it was Kamala, but in 2016 it was Hillary Clinton. And much earlier, in 1972, Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman to run for president. Despite her failed attempt, she at least planted in the collective imagination the possibility of having a democracy led by a black woman and daughter of immigrants. She inspired generations like Kamala, who made history in 2020 as the first black female vice president. In her mind, she carries a warning from her mother: "Kamala, you may be the first to do many things, but make sure you are not the last."
Black women represent 7.7% of the U.S. population. Any of them at Kamala's age who has climbed the ranks has found herself as the first black woman in each of those positions. Some analysts do not rule out racial aspects as one of the obstacles on the path to the White House and argue that the usual sexist attacks become even more virulent due to this factor.
However, according to the majority opinion of political scientists and the data from surveys, there is a significant distrust in women to govern the country. Even if they have the necessary qualifications, their gender hinders them from receiving votes at the polls.
Agustín Laje Arrigoni, writer and political scientist, believes that "Harris had her best moment in the days following her selection as Joe Biden's replacement. But it was a bubble effect; what we saw was the immediate enthusiasm for the change in candidacy, the excitement for the idea of a progressive, Democratic, African-American woman, constructed through media that later could not sustain the fiction of the candidate they were creating. Then it began to deflate, and she did not have good responses in terms of economic policy, which is what matters most to the average American today."
There is a more extreme theory that elevates distrust to an almost structural misogyny. In fact, even today, women still have restricted access to many little-known private clubs where men hold many strings of power. This is the case of the secretive Bohemian Grove in Sonoma County, California.
The combination of these elements, along with the failure of female candidates, has led to only a few women aspiring to the U.S. presidency, perhaps because they know in advance that they will not even have enough support within political parties. Hillary Clinton was acknowledged as a highly qualified politician with a solid track record and high approval ratings as a senator and Secretary of State under Barack Obama's administration. However, as a candidate, she became a target of mockery and misinformation. Her defeat was disappointing for many women. The feeling is that they have to be doubly capable to receive half the credit.
Most paradoxically, there is a disconnect between citizens' responses when asked on the street and their final choice. Since 2003, surveys have repeatedly shown that a large majority believes it is time for a female presidential candidate, but this belief does not translate into votes. Gallup, CBS News, the Hearst/Siena College Research Institute, and the Roper Center polls have consistently shown percentages above 80% in favor of this idea.
Why this contradiction? In practice, the population still believes that some key issues, such as security, terrorism, or the economy in foreign policy, are male prerogatives, while they would entrust them with healthcare, education, the environment, and other aspects considered more domestic.
The perception is more negative among elites, who impose typically masculine traits in their leadership assessment, such as strength or quick decision-making. Hence some of Kamala's attitudes, like the emphasis on her masculinized attire. According to some surveys conducted after Hillary Clinton's defeat, the candidate's insistence on the glass ceiling and sexism influenced many undecided voters to offer their vote to Trump.
Aside from being qualified, a woman must earn credibility as a firm and decisive leader in handling those stereotypically male spheres: security, foreign policy, and the economy. Even culturally, in the United States, the cult of personality and that presidential machismo that exalts the heroic image and tough tone prevail, as seen in movies like Air Force One, with Harrison Ford as the president. It is challenging for a female candidate to fit into that archetype. No one doubts that the day will come when a woman occupies the highest office in the United States, but for now, the glass ceiling remains intact.