A new study by George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication found that “62% of registered voters prefer to vote for a candidate for public office who supports action on global warming,” and that “39% of registered voters say a candidate’s position on global warming will be ‘very important’ when they decide who they will vote for in the 2024 presidential election.”
The study also found strong “support for building clean energy infrastructure locally,” adding that, “Majorities of registered voters support climate-friendly energy production and distribution infrastructure in their local area, including solar farms (65%), wind farms (58%), high-voltage power lines to distribute clean energy (54%), and electric vehicle charging stations (51%).” This support crosses party lines too, GMU found, saying that “many liberal/moderate Republicans,” support it, as well as majorities of Democrats. That aligns with another one of the study’s findings: that 69% of moderate Republicans believe global warming is happening now, and 70% of moderate Republicans support more funding of renewable energy research.
Women are very focused on climate change, too, the study found, citing that 83% of women registered voters believe climate change is happening now. That matters, since women vote in higher numbers than men these days, according to Celinda Lake, President of renowned 30-year old market research firm Lake Research Partners, as she explained in a recent in-depth interview on Electric Ladies Podcast.
“Women now register and turn out in higher numbers than their male counterparts,” Lake said, and described the power of the female voter today this way: “She is 53% of the electorate, 59% of Democratic primaries, and really the fortunes of the president, she will decide the presidency.”
Women are the key to swing states too, Lake added, but cautioned that, “She’s not monolithic though. She can be a 40-year-old woman, she can be a young college educated woman. She can be a single mom, a woman of color, she can be a grandmother. So, understanding all the different kinds of women out there is very important.”
What motivates women to vote on climate change?
“Women are very worried about these (extreme weather) events, and they’re the ones that really worry about the impact on communities. They worry that whether you’re talking about a Kentucky or a Maui, these communities have not recovered.”
She added that how the president in office manages these issues matters to women voters too. In 2024, we actually know how both presumptive Democratic and Republican nominees handle these crises. Lake explained that women voters remember what Trump did when Puerto Rico was hit, for example, and “They are incensed. They remember the vivid imagery of Donald Trump throwing paper towels at people from Puerto Rico who were out of their homes.” In contrast, “They like the compassionate president. They like someone who’s in tune.” Biden’s empathetic all-of-government approach to these disasters seems more “in tune” with what Lake describes women seek in a president.
What motivates these women voters in addition to how their own communities fare? “They want to leave a better country for their children,” Lake said, adding, “Women have been very influenced by their children and their grandchildren. They will say that climate change is something that really is on my agenda more because my children talk to me about it and they listen to their children and grandchildren.”
Who explains it – and how – matters
The GMU study found that only 28% of 18–34-year-old women hear about climate change in the media, and only 20% of 18–34-year-old men, and the highest percentage of women hearing about it in the media is 55% of women 55+ years old (versus only 38% of men 55+).
Since a lot more women say they care about climate change than hear about it in the media, there’s an opportunity to communicate more.
Celinda Lake emphasized that how global warming and climate change are communicated is key, that women respond to the word “climate” and “They’re very worried about pollution, destruction of communities.”
“The language that resonates the most,” with women voters, Lake explained, “is language that talks about the way that people live things in real lived experience. So, not degrees of temperature or, you know, statistics or acronyms. And that’s true for the economy too.”
“It’s extreme weather damage to the climate, health issues that are more serious. So, the way this impacts everyday people’s real lived experience,” she suggested. Interestingly, weather people have the most credibility with women voters, Lake noticed in their research, “They’re very deferential to people who report on the weather, believe it or not, weather men and weather women have a huge impact, and they’re perceived to be impartial. They’re not perceived to be a political force.”
“Women are also very responsive to public servants,” according to Lake. “First responders who say, ‘I’m seeing this,’ more healthcare providers who say, ‘I’m seeing this more,’ nurses, that kind of thing. Really. The people that translate (climate change) into the cost for human beings, the people that are impartial, public servants, the people who have firsthand, on the ground experience.”
Climate is a key issue in this November’s election – especially for women voters – so we’ll see how candidates respond and how it’s reflected in the actual votes.