Susan Page

USA TODAY

The woman's card? Hillary Clinton is playing it — and Donald Trump is helping her.

As the Democratic National Convention prepares to make history by nominating a woman for president, women in national polls are giving Clinton the highest level of female support of any candidate in more than four decades and the widest gender gap ever recorded. Clinton's lead of a yawning 24 percentage points in the latest Pew Research Center Poll — not only among Democratic partisans but also from women who typically vote Republican — is an electoral challenge for the GOP that imperils Trump's ability to win the White House.

In interviews with women across the country by the USA TODAY Network, some supporters are elated by the prospect of shattering what Clinton has called "the final, hardest glass ceiling," electing the first female president. "It's about time," says Stephanie Parra, 31, an education consultant in Phoenix. The Latina says Clinton is "breaking barriers for us."

Clinton joins other female political trailblazers

But other women are driven less by support for Clinton than by antipathy to Trump. That's particularly true among Millennials, voters 35 and younger who were part of the Obama coalition but haven't warmed to Clinton, at least not yet. While seven in 10 younger women support Clinton, they say by more than 2-1 that their choice is more a vote against him than for her.

Lauren Rolwing, 32, an illustrator from Nashville who was interviewed at a downtown pet-shop-turned-coffeehouse called Fido, is still sporting her Bernie Sanders campaign button though she acknowledges he's not going to be the Democratic nominee. She's undecided between voting for Clinton or a third-party candidate.

"At this time, I'm not going to take anything off the table other than voting for Trump," she says. "That's off the table."

Alarm over Trump's provocative policies and rhetoric also is costing him support among some white women who typically vote Republican. White women without a college degree have backed GOP nominees by double-digits in each of the past three presidential elections, but in the Pew survey they support Trump over Clinton by just three percentage points, 48%-45%.

The reason? Clinton's supporters in this demographic group say they are voting against him rather than for her (28%-17%). Even most of Trump's supporters indicate they are choosing the lesser of two evils: They are more likely to say they are voting against Clinton than for him (27%-19%).

The Pew poll of 1,655 registered voters, taken June 15-26, has a margin of error of +/-2.4 percentage points.

Of course, some female voters support Trump, and enthusiastically.

"Trump is our only hope to gain our country back," Teresa Willis, 60, a massage therapist and hairdresser from Mason, Ohio, declared in an interview at a raucous Trump rally last week in nearby Sharonville, outside Cincinnati. She is most concerned about national security and about restoring religion in American society and schools. "I believe this election is our last chance."

USA TODAY/Suffolk Poll: Clinton's lead over Trump narrows to 5 points

"I'm very concerned about the economy and things like that," says Alyssa Weisser, 43, a small-business owner from St. Clairsville, Ohio, who went to a Trump rally there last month. "Obviously, Trump knows a lot about creating jobs and owning a business and running it — which Hillary has not run anything."

That said, Trump trailed Clinton among women in the Pew poll by 35%-59%. He led among men by six points, 49%-43%. If that held to Election Day, the 16-point difference in Clinton's support among women and men would swamp the record 11-point gender gap set in 1996. Then, female support for Bill Clinton gave him his margin of victory over Republican Bob Dole.

"Sixteen points? That's gigantic," says Susan Carroll, a professor at the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University and co-editor of Gender and Elections: Shaping the Future of American Politics. "That's off the radar screen."

'It's Irrelevant'

Some Americans aren't comfortable with the idea of electing the first female president. In the latest USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll, only a third of women said they felt excitement about the prospect of Clinton's groundbreaking election. In fact, a bit more said they felt unease. More than one in four said it didn't make any difference to them.

"It's such a shallow thing and, for me, it's irrelevant," says Hope Ellison-Scipione, 51, of Grosse Pointe Park, in suburban Detroit. Ellison-Scipione, who designs office space for the IRS, enthusiastically supports Clinton, but for reasons other than her gender. "She has the most experience, and she's going to be able to continue what (President) Obama has started," she says.

Clinton, 68, wins support from nine of 10 African American women and from more than seven in 10 Latinas in the Pew poll. By generation, her widest margin of support is among Millennials but her most positive support -- those voting mostly for her rather than against Trump -- comes from women in her own generation, the Baby Boomers. College-educated white women typically lean Democratic, but Clinton now leads among them by a stunning margin of 31 points, 62%-31%.

She even holds a narrow lead, 46%-43%, among married white women, a group that has supported Republicans by wide margins in recent presidential elections. Holding the support of suburban white women looms as a key test of the GOP coalition this year.

Poll: Clinton far ahead of Trump with Hispanic voters

"I think it's fantastic that a woman is finally on the ticket," says Marsha Pulizzano, 32, who lives in the Milwaukee suburb of Brookfield. "I think our kids are going to grow up and think nothing of it, whereas for us it's this huge ordeal."

Even so, Pulizzano, who supported Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in the state's Republican primary this spring, isn't sure which nominee she'll vote for in November. "Right now, if I had to pick, I guess I'd pick Hillary, but I'm not a fan of either," she says, worrying, "Trump flies off the handle."

Maggie Ensing, 29, a former teacher and stay-at-home mom from another Milwaukee suburb, Franklin, has voted Republican in every presidential election since she turned 18, and of the primary contenders she liked Ohio Gov. John Kasich best. But she's also uncertain about the choice between Trump and Clinton.

"I don't like either of you," she says plaintively. "Can we have someone else, please?"

Later, she calls back to discuss the dilemma she feels.

"Our country is extremely polarized, divided and tense," she said. "My dream candidate would have been someone who could ease that somewhat. Unfortunately, you couldn't ask for two candidates that are more opposite of each other. This entire election makes our country feel more out of control and disconnected than ever. This is the heart of why I feel so uneasy about November."

Can you trust her?

In some subtle ways, Clinton's gender may be boosting her among female voters. Most say she has a sense of their lives and "understands the needs of people like them;" by an overwhelming margin, they don't feel that way towards Trump. Women tend to judge Clinton less harshly on whether she is honest and trustworthy, a crucial vulnerability.

"There's some empathy involved based on the experience of being a woman," Carroll says. "Women may say ... she's done some things but so have other politicians, but she gets judged." The Rutgers political scientist also says the fact that Clinton now speaks more directly than she did in 2008 about her life, her grandchildren and issues of special concern to women may be bolstering her appeal.

To be sure, there's still skepticism about her character and criticism of some controversies, including her use of a private email server while she was secretary of State.

"It's always a cover-up with them," Willis, the Trump supporter from Ohio, scoffs about the Clintons.

But Jill Goldmann Weinshel, 51, a stay-at-home mom from Mequon, Wis., wonders whether gender has been a factor in the attacks on Clinton. "Are the issues being brought up against her gender-related or thinly veiled? I'm not sure," she says. "Maybe that is part of why people have a hard time warming up to her, because she doesn't fit the old stereotype."

Views about the impact of being a female candidate have shifted significantly since Clinton lost the Democratic nomination eight years ago to Barack Obama. Then, voters in a January 2008 Pew poll predicted the fact that Clinton was a woman was more likely to hurt her than help. More than a third said it wouldn't make a difference.

Now, nearly half predict it won't make a difference, and those who see an impact say by overwhelming margins that it is more likely to help her than hurt her. Men are more confident about that than women are, and younger women are more optimistic about the potential impact than older women are.

"We're very much in need of a woman's voice," says Sharon Smith, 75, a retired teacher from Urbandale, Iowa, and Clinton supporter who sees the candidate's gender as both a boost and a hurdle. "We like a strong woman in the home, but how about a strong woman in the community?"

Reporting by Keith BieryGolick, The Cincinnati Enquirer; Joel Ebert, The (Nashville) Tennessean; Kathleen Gray, The Detroit Free Press; Sarah Hauer, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; Jason Noble, The Des Moines Register; Dan Nowicki, The Arizona Republic; Chrissie Thompson, The Cincinnati Enquirer, and Susan Page, USA TODAY.