In the contest between Sanders and Hillary Clinton, the votes of young women have become a key area of contention, with theories proliferating as to why they seem to strongly prefer Sanders. Tonight, New Hampshire’s young women voters confirmed the trend. According to exit poll analysis:
Sanders won women by 53-46 percent, as well as prevailing far more widely among men, 65-34 percent. Sixty-nine percent of women under 45 backed Sanders (including 82 percent of those under 30 women), while Clinton won women 45 and older by 56-43 percent.
Among all voters under age 30, Sanders beat Clinton by a huge 84-15 percent margin, another result similar to Iowa.
In all, less than 20 percent of young women in New Hampshire voted for Clinton. Why?
Today I theorized that the female 17-29 set leans heavily toward Sanders for reasons related to their age and age-related social positions. New Hampshire Democrats also register as especially liberal and invested in “honesty and trustworthiness,” so Sanders’s far-left, consistent-messaging tack likely helped him across the board.