hillary clinton became the first democratic presidential candidate<u+00a0>in 20 years<u+00a0>to win married women, but a lack of support from other pockets of the female electorate helped block her path to the white house. white women overall voted for donald trump by a decisive margin, and white women without college degrees broke even more heavily for the republican nominee, according to exit polls. among women overall, mrs. clinton won a slightly smaller share of the female electorate than barack obama did in 2012 and 2008. democrats hoped that emphasizing mr. trump<u+2019>s history of lewd remarks about women and allegations of sexual assault against the candidate would prompt female voters to turn against him. yet the spread between how men and women voted this week<u+2014>with 54% of women backing mrs. clinton and 42% backing mr. trump<u+2014>was only slightly wider than the gap in 2012 when mr. obama and mitt romney split female voters 55% and 44%, respectively. trump voters across genders signaled they punched their ticket for the candidate despite having misgivings about his treatment of women. almost three in 10 people who said his treatment of women bothered them voted for him anyway. <u+201c>people were willing to overlook things that they didn<u+2019>t like about him,<u+201d> said democratic pollster anna greenberg. after downplaying her gender when she first ran for president in 2008, mrs. clinton embraced being the first female presidential nominee of a major political party throughout this year<u+2019>s campaign. clinton t-shirts and placards boasted <u+201c>i<u+2019>m with her,<u+201d> and her campaign rented a manhattan convention center with an actual glass ceiling for what they hoped would be an election-night victory party. view interactive yet in interviews, some women said that electing the first female president wasn<u+2019>t a reason to back the mrs. clinton. they cited misgivings about her use of a private email server while secretary of state, the fact they didn<u+2019>t trust her or that they disagreed with her policies to expand government aid, such as her plan for free tuition for certain colleges. <u+201c>there isn<u+2019>t a great deal of evidence that either her positions on issues or her candidacy as a woman [moved] the numbers very much,<u+201d> said karlyn bowman, senior fellow at the conservative american enterprise institute in washington. despite that, mrs. clinton notched some accomplishments with female voters that have long eluded her party. she won 49% of married women while mr. trump took 47% of them, making her the first democrat to clinch that group since her husband, bill clinton, defeated bob dole in 1996. married women may have been more likely than other female voters to part ways with mr. trump on account of his temperament and demeanor, though their exact motivations are unclear, ms. bowman said. they include women like kathleen phillips, a 58-year-old lafayette, ind., wife and mother, who voted republican for president in most elections ever since she cast a ballot for gerald r. ford in 1976. she said she was so turned off by mr. trump<u+2019>s crude remarks that she voted for mrs. clinton this year. <u+00a0><u+201c>she has poise and confidence,<u+201d> ms. phillips said. mrs. clinton also received hefty support from minority women, winning 94% of black female voters and 68% of latino women. but she lost white women overall to mr. trump, taking 43% of those voters while the republican nominee got 53% of them. mr. trump<u+2019>s success with blue-collar voters helps explain part of that. among white women without college degrees, mr. trump won 62% of the vote while mrs. clinton took 34%, an even wider gap than when mr. obama lost the group to mr. romney four years ago. by contrast, mrs. clinton won white female college graduates, getting 51% of those voters while mr. trump won 45% of them. mr. romney took the group in 2012. <u+201c>there are women, especially older blue-collar women, who are skeptical about women<u+2019>s political leadership,<u+201d> ms. greenberg said. <u+201c>we still live in a sexist country.<u+201d> <u+2014>paul overberg contributed to this article. write to janet adamy at janet.adamy@wsj.com
one factor in hillary clinton<u+2019>s defeat: lack of support from some women voters - wsj
janet adamy