Donald Trump Is More Popular With Men Than Ever Before

Former President Donald Trump is polling stronger with men than he did in his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns, according to several recent surveys.
Trump won male voters in both the 2020 and 2016 presidential races, according to New York Times exit polls, and gender polarization—a term that describes recent trends of men shifting toward Republicans as women become more Democratic—is expected to continue in the race between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris.
Election Day is now less than a month away, and both candidates are making their final plays to win over undecided voters and maximize turnout among their voter base.
Three recent surveys suggest Trump may be gaining ground among male voters.
A Pew Research Center survey released earlier in October showed Trump with an 8-point lead over Harris. Fifty-one percent of male respondents said they plan to vote for him, compared to 43 percent saying they plan to support Harris in November.
The poll surveyed 4,025 registered likely voters from September 30 to October 6 and showed Harris with a single-point lead among the wider electorate (50 percent to 49 percent).
A Pew poll released in October 2020 showed President Joe Biden winning male voters by a 4-point margin, with 49 percent saying they would vote for Biden and 45 percent saying they would vote for Trump. However, in October 2016, a Pew poll showed Trump up seven points among men, winning 41 percent of their support compared to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 34 percent.
Recent New York Times/Siena College and YouGov/The Economist polls showed similar findings.
The Times poll, conducted among 3,385 likely voters from September 29 to October 6, showed Trump with an 11-point lead over Harris among men (53 percent to 42 percent).
An October 2020 Times poll showed Trump leading by six points among men (48 percent to 42 percent).
A YouGov poll, which surveyed 1,230 likely voters from October 6 to October 7, showed Trump up by five points among men (48 percent to 43 percent), while an October 2020 poll showed him trailing Biden by five points among men, with 50 percent backing Biden compared to 45 percent backing Trump.
Grant Davis Reeher, a professor of political science at Syracuse University, told Newsweek that not much about Trump has changed, so any differences may have more to do with Harris’ campaign.
“Harris and the Democratic campaign have really emphasized the identity aspect of the Democratic Party’s messaging, and she’s also emphasized her gender in her appeals,” he said.
Their messaging, as well as an emphasis on abortion to “lean into their advantage with women,” could be making some men “more receptive to an alternative message and candidate,” he said.
Robert Y. Shapiro, a professor of political science at Columbia University, told Newsweek, “This is a continuation of his appeal to male voters in which he is likely making inroads among Latino and Black men without college degrees. Men may be less inclined to vote for a non-white woman candidate.”
With less than a month until the election, winning over voters leaning toward Trump will be difficult for Harris, Shapiro said. She is “rightly” focusing on voters such as men who don’t like Trump but may not be ready to vote for her, he said.
Newsweek reached out to the Trump and Harris campaigns for comment via email.
Notably, Trump outperformed the polls in both 2016 and 2020. While it’s possible he has made gains among men, these differences may also reflect changes in polling methodology after 2020 to avoid undercounting his support. Whether or not these apparent gains play out will be seen on Election Day.
In 2020, Trump won male voters by eight points (53 percent to 45 percent), according to the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research. Biden notably improved upon Clinton’s performance among men in the 2016 election, when she lost by 11 points to Trump (52 percent to 41 percent).
Trump campaign Senior Advisor Brian Hughes pointed to the economy and immigration as to why Republicans are winning over male voters in a statement to Newsweek.
“Democrats have been losing ground with male voters cycle after cycle because Kamala Harris’ agenda to raise costs, hike taxes, open the southern border, and weaken America in the eyes of the world has made all Americans worse off,” he said.
Former President Barack Obama also lost male voters in his 2012 run. Mitt Romney won 52 percent of male voters, compared to the 45 percent who voted for Obama.
Obama did win the male vote in 2008 by a single percentage point. Forty-nine percent of men voted for him, while 48 percent voted for Senator John McCain.
While campaigning for Harris in the battleground state of Pennsylvania on Thursday, Obama addressed polls suggesting that some Black men are shifting toward Republicans.
“Part of it makes me think, and I’m speaking to men directly, part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president, and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for that,” Obama said during a surprise visit to Harris’ campaign field office in Pittsburgh.
Young Black men, who typically back Democrats by wide margins, have shifted toward Trump in recent polls, potentially explaining why Trump may be doing better with men overall. A September NAACP poll showed that 26 percent of Black men younger than 50 plan to back Trump, reported Reuters.
Sarah Longwell, the publisher of The Bulwark, discussed the gender gap on the Playbook Deep Dive podcast on Friday.
“I’m worried this is going to become a boy versus girl election,” Longwell said. “And that we’re going to move into an environment where the biggest voting indicator is no longer going to be education or geography; it’s simply going to be gender.”
She said the gender gap is “enormous” among young voters and less so among older voters. Younger men and women live in different news ecosystems.
She said younger men often get their news from influencers like Jordan Peterson, Joe Rogan and Andrew Tate.
“They tend to be not apolitical but just not particularly political, and, as a result, they have enormous cultural influence,” Longwell said. “When they start talking about politics, they often are very against…woke. They don’t like cancel culture or language policing. They’re usually pro-choice men, and they have more socially liberal values, which is actually one of Trump’s big strengths with young men.”
Gender has emerged as a hot topic of the 2024 election. Harris has emphasized her support for abortion rights, hoping that Trump’s previous statements praising the Supreme Court for overturning Roe v. Wade could alienate moderate women from voting Republican this year.
The election has also been a race for each party to define masculinity.
Conservatives frequently make references to masculinity on social media and the campaign trail, often sharing memes painting Trump and his running mate in a hypermasculine light or attacking their opponents’ sense of masculinity.
Trump, for instance, attacked radio host Howard Stern in a Truth Social post as a “beta male” over his recent interview with Harris.
Obama pushed back on Trump’s idea of masculinity, lamented by his critics as a form of “toxic masculinity,” on Thursday.
“I’m sorry, gentlemen, I’ve noticed this, especially with some men who seem to think Trump’s behavior—the bullying and the putting people down—is a sign of strength,” Obama said. “I am here to tell you that is not what real strength is. It never has been.
Trump’s media strategy has, in part, aimed to appeal to younger men. He has campaigned alongside social media personalities like streamer Adin Ross, who is popular among younger men. This could allow him to reach younger men who may not necessarily follow politics closely.
Gender polarization may continue after the election, particularly if Trump wins and continues to “behave as he has in the past—or worse—as related to women,” Shapiro said.
“But I think it will continue to hover around what has been the normal gap unless new generations of men and women and/or minority group voters have a large gap. We do not know at this point,” he said.
Reeher said it is “quite possible” for gender polarization to continue.
“It’s hard to imagine that we could become even more polarized than we already are, but there is nothing to suggest that the curve is starting to bend,” he said.