Women don’t like Donald J. Trump. Or at least that’s what hacks in the news media like myself say, right? But don’t take it from me. Take it from female voters themselves. A CNN/ORC poll conducted in March found that 73 percent of women from both parties say they don’t like him, an increase from 59 percent in December. Among Republican women, this number is much lower but still significant: 39 percent said they had a negative view of him.

It’s the same story: According to Gallup women’s distaste for Mr. Trump has crept up from 58 percent last July to 70 percent in April. And a Washington Post-ABC News poll from April showed that a three-quarters of female respondents had a somewhat or strongly unfavorable view of Mr. Trump. From implying that Carly Fiorina was too ugly to vote for to retweeting an unflattering photo of Heidi Cruz, there’s plenty in the Trump campaign so far to cause women to say, “No, thanks.”

Then there is that other 25 percent.

In conversations, many women who support Mr. Trump expressed similar defenses of their preferred candidate. He’s not sexist, he’s just not politically correct. He’s not a career politician, so he doesn’t stick his finger in the wind before he says something. He believes in treating women as tough as he treats men. The news media has distorted his message with cherry-picked sound bites. If he were sexist, would he have promoted so many female executives, including his daughter, within his own company?

Perhaps in response to the claims of misogyny that have been leveled against him, the Trump campaign has deployed a legion of women to serve as his surrogates on cable TV. Scottie Nell Hughes, a Tea Party activist and conservative blogger from Nashville, is one of the most visible. (She seems to be relishing this moment in American politics; her cellphone’s ringback tone is the theme song from “House of Cards”). She pointed to the Miss Universe pageant as evidence of Mr. Trump’s equal treatment of women. “It wasn’t just because he wanted to see women in bathing suits,” she said. “It was because he actually wanted to give these women opportunities.”