It's been a rough couple of weeks for Ivanka Trump. After being heralded on the campaign trail as a levelheaded moderate who might be able to win over female voters for her father, she's been caricatured recently for being "complicit" in President Donald Trump's agenda and criticized for her recent decision to take a job in the West Wing.
There are also rumors that she and her husband, Jared Kushner, are in a power struggle with Donald Trump's controversial chief strategist, Stephen Bannon—and as a result, right-wing news outlets like Breitbart, which Bannon used to edit, are lashing out at the couple. Now, a new poll conducted by SurveyMonkey shows that, although she still remains slightly more popular than her father, young women have a particularly negative view of the first daughter.
According to the survey, 39 percent of Americans overall have a favorable view of Ivanka Trump, while 37 percent have an unfavorable view, and 22 percent say they don't know enough to say. (First lady Melania Trump matches Ivanka in popularity, with an identical approval rating of 39 percent, and an unfavorability rating of 33 percent.) And while the same number of Americans (39 percent) have a favorable impression of Donald Trump, far more (59 percent) say they're displeased with the president than with his daughter or his wife.
An approval rating under 40 percent isn't much to brag about—former first lady Michelle Obama's favorability rating averaged above 60 percent during her eight year tenure, for example—but it's relatively high compared to other members of the Trump inner circle. Although more respondents seemed unfamiliar with Ivanka Trump's husband and Donald Trump's senior adviser, Jared Kushner, or other key Trump administration figures like White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, the favorability ratings of those figures were even lower than those of Donald, Ivanka and Melania. Only 26 percent of Americans have a favorable view of counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway, 25 percent have a favorable view of Kushner and press secretary Sean Spicer, 21 percent have a favorable view of Priebus and 20 percent have a favorable view of Bannon.
But despite her emphasis on providing support for women in the workforce, Ivanka Trump is more popular among men than among women. Only 35 percent of women view her favorably, compared to 44 percent of men. Again, these numbers are nearly identical to Melania Trump's favorability ratings among men and women, although the first lady has less visibly positioned herself as a champion for women.
Ivanka's focus on women's' rights has come under increasing scrutiny since her father moved into the White House. She reportedly reached out to progressive organizations like Planned Parenthood and the National Women's Law Center in the weeks after her father's inauguration, but Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood, called out Ivanka Trump last week for her failure to speak up against her father's policies, pointing out that she is "one of the highest-ranking women" in the administration. "Anyone who works in this White House is responsible for addressing why women are in the cross-hairs of basically every single policy that we've seen out of this administration," Richards said.
In a recent interview with CBS, Ivanka defended herself against accusations that she is complicit in her father's agenda, saying she'll continue to work for women's education and economic empowerment. "Where I disagree with my father, he knows it. And I express myself with total candor," she said.
But younger women—who ostensibly stand to benefit from policies Ivanka has advocated for, like a child-care tax credit and maternity leave protection—seem especially unconvinced. Only 21 percent of women ages 18 to 34 have a favorable view of her, while a majority (52 percent) view her unfavorably. By contrast, 32 percent of younger men and 45 percent of women over the age of 65 have a positive impression.
Some of the survey's findings may be explained by the fact that more women tend to be Democrats, regardless of age. Women, overall, were less likely than men to have a favorable view of the president, his family and advisers: For example, nearly half (46 percent) of men have a positive impression of Donald Trump, compared to only 32 percent of women.
Despite wide partisan gaps in perceptions of the Trump inner circle, there were still noteworthy splits in perception between younger and older women, even among Republicans—and in some cases, younger women's views of Ivanka and Melania Trump were more negative than their views of the president. Sixty-seven percent of younger Republican women had a favorable view of Ivanka, and 60 percent had a favorable view of Melania, while 71 percent had a favorable view of Donald Trump. These findings are especially striking compared to Republican women between the ages of 35 and 64: More than 80 percent of these women had favorable views of the president, the first lady and the first daughter.
Although according to the survey, Donald Trump's family members and closest advisers are unpopular among younger women across the board, the low favorability numbers may be especially bad for Ivanka, who has worked to build a reputation as an advocate for young working women. If these women continue to have a negative impression of her, Ivanka may need to rethink her strategy for convincing them that she is serious about her mission of empowerment.
