Within hours of Kamala Harris entering the race for president, thousands of Black women threw their support behind her, with many vowing to go door to door to get her elected and to fundraise on her behalf. A new Cut survey of 1,200 Black women reflected that strong support for the vice-president, with 76 percent agreeing that Harris is the right person to replace President Joe Biden and 77 percent saying they believe Harris is the candidate most likely to beat Trump.
But they’re split on the question of whether Americans actually are ready to send a Black woman to the White House. Nearly two-thirds say concerns about the country not being ready to elect a Black woman are true or fair, while 37 percent believe those concerns are exaggerated. Younger Black women ages 18 to 34 are more likely to agree with concerns that Americans are not ready to elect a Black woman.
The survey is the second of four that the Cut is running ahead of Election Day. It polled Black women ages 18 to 55 between July 24 and August 2, after Biden stepped down as the Democratic nominee and endorsed Harris.
Since the change at the top of the ticket, the survey found a significant increase in the share of Black women who plan to vote in the presidential election, up to 89 percent from 82 percent in June. If the election took place today, 75 percent would vote for Harris, 12 percent would vote for Trump, and 3 percent would vote for Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (Six percent said they would still vote for Biden.)
Positive perceptions of Harris and the Democratic Party also have increased since June, with the vice-president’s job approval shooting up from 68 percent to 78 percent in August. The share of Black women who say they feel pressure to support Harris has increased significantly as well, up to 41 percent from 36 percent in June. A majority of Black women, 65 percent, believe that Biden was right to drop out of the 2024 race.
How Black women feel about Trump
Trump is losing support among Black women since Biden exited the 2024 race. In June, the Cut’s survey found 18 percent of Black women planned to vote for Trump, but by August, that number fell to 12 percent. Support for the former president was strongest among younger women ages 18 to 34 across both surveys.
The July 13 attempt on Trump’s life didn’t boost his standing among Black women overall, the latest survey found, although 67 percent of his supporters say the assassination attempt made it more likely that they’d vote for him. Trump’s criminal conviction, however, did hurt Black women’s perceptions of him, with 61 percent overall saying they are less likely to vote for the former president. Still, only 12 percent of Trump’s supporters say they are less likely to vote for him because of his conviction on federal hush-money charges.
With age and mental acuity becoming a central talking point in this election, a majority of Black women, 77 percent, say they view Trump as unfit to serve as president. Seventy percent say Harris has the mental and physical fitness for the job, while only 17 percent still view Biden as completely fit to serve.
Trump’s racist claim at the National Association of Black Journalists conference that Harris only recently “became” Black also may further damage his standing. The survey, which was conducted before the event, found 78 percent of Black women said they are less likely to vote for a candidate who makes racist comments — and that includes 58 percent of Trump supporters.
What issues actually influence how Black women vote
Black women say police violence, gun violence and street crime, and abortion are the issues that will have the greatest impact on their voting behavior this year, according to the survey. Additional analysis indicates that Black women’s perceptions of candidates’ fitness to serve as president, Trump’s felony conviction, and how Harris is handling her job, as well as whether they believe the country is moving in the right direction on public safety and crime, are strongly correlated with their choice of presidential candidate. (Just 30 percent view America as moving in the right direction on public safety and crime.)
While only 18 percent of Black women believe the country is moving in the right direction on the issue of abortion, less than a third ranked it among the top three issues most important to them. By comparison, 48 percent ranked racial justice and equity among the issues most important to them, while 42 percent cited inflation and the economy, 41 percent cited health care, and 36 percent cited housing.
The survey also found that personal experience with student debt (35 percent of respondents) or job loss (34 percent) is correlated to Black women’s choice of candidate, despite less than half of respondents saying that these issues would impact how they vote this year. Twenty-eight percent also say they’ve faced housing insecurity. This focus on direct needs could benefit Harris, as 70 percent of Black women say they believe she’s the candidate that would have the most positive impact on their personal finances if elected. Seventeen percent believe Trump would have the most positive impact on their finances, while 7 percent believe Biden would benefit their wallet the most.
In another warning sign for Trump, who claimed in June’s presidential debate that immigrants were taking “Black jobs,” the survey found Black women rank immigration as the least important issue to them. Voting rights, threats to democracy, educational opportunities, and climate change also ranked lowest among issues of importance to this group.
Regardless of their motivations, the vast majority of Black women, or 85 percent, feel an obligation to the Black community to vote this year, according to the survey, and 72 percent of them believe voting will have a positive impact.