Out-Spent, Out-Numbered, Out-Researched

"We've read plenty about women voters who supported President Obama 55-44, creating an 11-point gender gap," writes Sabrina Schaeffer. "But we have paid scant attention to the wealth of Progressive women’s organizations that helped drive this victory, their vast funding capability, or the fact that they’re armed with a new science of politics."

Schaeffer lists several of the many liberal "research, grassroots, and fundraising machines" that pour resources into wooing women: Emily's List—$51 million; Catalyst—$12 million; League of Women Voters—$9 million; Women's Voices Women Vote/WVWV Action—$8 million.

Against this tapestry of Progressive organizations pouring millions into research and programs, what do we have on the Right? The reality is when it comes to securing women voters conservatives are out-numbered, out-researched, and outspent.

AEI’s Christina Hoff Sommers said it best at a recent IWF policy forum, “Conservative leaders and funders don’t take women’s issues seriously. They tend to treat women’s groups like the Ladies Auxiliary and women’s issues as a distracting side show.”

Sommers is right... The Right can count among their ranks exceptional individuals like Hoff Sommers, Diana Furchgott-Roth, June O’Neill, Carrie Lukas, and Kay Hymowitz, writing independently at different think tanks. There are a handful of women’s groups like the Independent Women’s Forum, where I’m the executive director, and our sister organization the Independent Women’s Voice, as well as Concerned Women for America, Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute, Smart Girl Politics, and VIEW Pac, which raised a mere $346,000 during the 2012 election to help elect Republican women candidates.

What the Right lacks is serious interest and investment in finding out how to move more women to our side. If conservatives truly want to shrink the gender gap and win elections, women can no longer be an after-thought. Conservatives need to invest meaningful resources into the groups that are speaking to women. And conservatives must embrace social science research, digital communications, and boots on the ground to find out what works and with whom.

Read her full article in Forbes.