Candidates ignore female voters at their peril: Women have outvoted men since 1980. Census data shows that nearly 10 million more women than men cast ballots in the 2020 elections.
But when it comes to another form of political participation — giving money to candidates — it's men who take the lead. We found that men gave more money than women to candidates in statewide elections for executive offices such as attorney general and secretary of state, between 2001 and 2020.
We found that men contribute more financially overall in statewide races, creating a large gender gap in political voice. This disparity exists in primary and general elections, across both political parties, and is seen in the most recent election cycle from 2017 to 2021.
Political contributions do not guarantee victory or political influence. However, helping candidates win through campaign contributions is a way to influence their policies once they're in office. Indeed, some political science research finds that elected officials are more responsive to their donors than to other Americans.
So while candidates may court women's votes on the campaign trail, they may be less interested in women's priorities once elected.
Party differences
State officeholders attract less public attention than the president and members of Congress, but we studied these races because the work of these officeholders has profound effects on people's lives.
Secretaries of state, for example, administer state voting laws and elections, an increasingly high-profile and controversial role. State attorneys general make sure state laws are enforced. And they often work together to collectively challenge federal policies from Obamacare to immigration. A state's elections are consequential both inside and beyond its boundaries.
Our study, done in collaboration with OpenSecrets, a nonpartisan research organization that tracks money in politics, found that from 2001 to 2020, female donors gave just 23 percent of general election contributions in statewide races for offices such as attorney general and secretary of state. Men donated 77 percent.
These results echo our companion report on gubernatorial elections. Other scholars who estimate both the race and gender of donors find that women of color represent the smallest percentage of donors.
The gender gap is not symmetric across the two major political parties. Women are a larger percentage of contributors to Democrats than Republicans in statewide races for offices such as attorney general and secretary of state, as is the case in congressional and gubernatorial races.
In some of the primary contests we examined, women are at parity with men as a proportion of contributors to Democrats. But overall, women constitute fewer than half of donors and provide less than half of the money raised by Democratic statewide candidates.
Implications for female candidates
We find that winners usually raise more money than their opponents, confirming that money matters.
The underrepresentation of female donors may contribute to the underrepresentation of women among statewide elected officials. Because women disproportionately give to female statewide executive candidates, the low percentage of women among donors disproportionately harms female candidates: More female donors means more resources for female candidates.
Resources are especially scarce for candidates who are women of color. There is a dearth of women of color in statewide executive positions, despite the election of Vice President Kamala Harris and record-setting numbers of women of color serving in Congress and state legislatures. No Black woman or Native American woman has ever won the office of governor in any state. Our research finds that women of color are raising less than white female candidates and that they are much less likely to seek statewide office.
The current number of female governors — eight — is one less than the historic high, first achieved in 2004. Without any major-party women among gubernatorial nominees in the two states with elections in 2021, no women will be elected governor this year.
Both of our reports show that female statewide executive candidates are less likely to finance their own campaigns and that women raise more money from small contributions than men. These differences likely mean that fundraising is more difficult for statewide executive candidates who are women.
According to several female statewide candidates and political practitioners we interviewed, men are more likely than women to have personal relationships with wealthy donors and access to networks of contributors; and donors and other political gatekeepers may believe, falsely, that women — particularly women of color — won't be successful candidates, making fundraising harder for them.
Research shows that women have closed many long-standing political participation gaps such as volunteering in campaigns and contacting public officials. Gains in women's educational and labor force opportunities have expanded women's personal resources in terms of income and civic skills, facilitating women's political giving. And women's organizations and networks such as EMILY's List, View PAC and Higher Heights have mobilized women to donate on a regular basis. Recent elections, including those in 2018, saw an increase in female donors
With the persistence of inequalities in earnings due to gender and race, and challenges wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic, the future of women's giving is unclear. But as the 2022 election unfolds, observers can watch for whether women give – and not just whether women run.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Click here to read the original article.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.