New campaign manager Kellyanne Conway was first hired and now promoted to help fix an issue she diagnosed long ago and continues to dog Donald Trump — the nominee's problem of attracting female voters.
Conway, promoted early Wednesday as part of a massive campaign shakeup, was first hired by the campaign in July to evangelize Trump to women voters. But even when she worked for a super PAC in support of Ted Cruz during the primary, she was able to zero in on Trump's Achilles heel in November, according to a story in The Washington Post.
Trump's negatives for women, according to the Post:
- Trump has been married three times
- Non church-going billionaire
- Tweeting the photo of Heidi Cruz
- Trump constantly changing his position on abortion
Conway did an interview saying Trump's polling with women was sliding because of it.
Women "see him as not willing to put in the work on these issues," the Post quoted Conway.
"Kellyanne is very good at understanding Republican women. But working with candidates like that and trying to not make them look like cave men — that's a tough job," Katie Packer, a Republican strategist, told the Post in July.
Conway's on the clock — 82 days and counting — to reverse the trend so that she can highlight the other candidate's problem with the other gender.
"We could recast the whole conversation about the gender gap not as a Republican Party's problem with women but as a Democratic Party's problem with men — unless you have her up against someone who is performing poorly among women," the Post quoted Conway from earlier this year.