NC governor’s race: Women voters among factors driving political rating shift favoring Stein

Welcome to the governor’s race edition of our Under the Dome politics newsletter. I’m Dawn Vaughan, The News & Observer’s Capitol bureau chief.

As we get closer to Election Day, the political polling winds are shifting in favor of Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein over Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, as I reported last week. But polls aren’t always accurate, and there are still two months until the election.

Now the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter has shifted its prediction of the North Carolina governor’s race, again.

The Cook Political Report listed North Carolina as “leans Democrat” earlier this year, then changed that to “toss up.” Now it’s back to “leans Democrat.” And a big factor in that assessment is women voters.

The report’s Swing State Project poll from GS Strategy Group and BSG favors Stein over Robinson 48% to 40% in August, compared to its May poll with the two tied at 43%.

That shift, Cook Political Report says, “has been especially pronounced among non-college-educated women, who shifted from Robinson +7 in May to Stein +10 in August, adding that “even Trump-supporting non-college women were turned off by Robinson’s demeaning comments about women.”

As I’ve previously reported, Robinson talked about women needing to “keep your skirt down” to prevent abortions in a selfie Facebook video he posted before running for governor. Stein’s campaign has an attack ad highlighting the video.

Cook also reported voters of color moving in Stein’s favor. Stein is white, while Robinson is the first Black lieutenant governor and would be the state’s first Black governor.

Robinson’s wife, Yolanda Hill, has been campaigning on his behalf by meeting with various groups of women for what Robinson’s campaign calls “Conversations From the Heart.” Robinson posts photos after Hill’s events, but they are not publicly announced like the campaign visits he announced this past week he would make to a variety of towns across the state, meeting voters in local restaurants.

In June, Robinson spoke to women in the ultra-conservative group Moms for Liberty at an event in Raleigh.

N.C. State Board of Elections data shows that there are 7.6 million registered voters in the state, and 3.7 million of them are women.

Stay informed about #ncpol

Don’t forget to follow our Under the Dome tweets and listen to our Under the Dome podcast to stay up to date. Our new episode posts Monday morning, and I’m joined by Western Carolina University political science professor Chris Cooper. We talk about changes in the governor’s race, presidential campaigning and much more.

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