Donald Trump says he loves women

Donald Trump says he loves women — but polls increasingly show they don't love him back.
A new Gallup tracking survey out Friday revealed 70 percent of women nationwide had a negative opinion of Trump. He splits Republican women in that same survey, with half each viewing him positively and negatively.
But North Carolina Rep. Renee Ellmers, the first female congresswoman to endorse the GOP frontrunner, is confident Trump can still appeal to women, if he sticks to what he knows.
"Women want to see someone who is a problem-solver and who is solutions-oriented," she said in a phone interview on Wednesday. "I don't think he needs to change his message for women…because every issue is a women's issue."
Ellmers should know — she's made GOP outreach to women a top priority during her time in Congress, serving as one of the chairwomen of the Republican Women's Policy Committee and counseling other members of her party on how to communicate with female voters.
The GOP has long faced challenges in wooing female voters — an 11-point advantage with women helped drive Obama to a win over GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney in 2012, and the RNC emphasized outreach to female voters as a key priority in its postmortem report on the election.
And Trump, some Republicans worry, could exacerbate that deficit if he becomes the nominee because of a long string of controversial comments he's made about women, culminating this week in remarks he made at an MSNBC town hall initially expressing support for punishing women who receive abortions if the procedure is outlawed.
His remarks sparked a firestorm of criticism and Trump quickly walked that stance back, issuing a statement within hours saying the abortionist would be held legally responsible, not the woman, who "is a victim in this case."
Ellmers' initial conversation with NBC News took place on Wednesday, before the latest controversy developed. But in an exclusive statement issued after Trump made his comments on abortion, the congresswoman distanced herself from the remarks. As a mother and someone who is a 100 percent pro-life, I have consistently fought to ensure the safety of the mother and the unborn," she said. "It has always been the goal within the pro-life community to end abortion altogether, but it's equally important that the focus remain on the woman and her child. Throughout this discussion, we need to be focused on compassionate outcomes as opposed to punishment."