Armed with new research, consultants warn ‘open season’ of sexist attacks in politics is over

New research that shows women candidates lose voters when they don't respond aggressively to sexist attacks is already changing the way women are running in this election cycle. The women behind the groundbreaking research say congressional candidate Krystal Ball in Virginia and California's Meg Whitman are using the findings to justify their desire to push back against sexist tactics they've faced in their races.

As recently as just a year ago, the researchers say, such candidates may have listened to conventional wisdom and stayed silent.

"You're watching history being made, actually," says Women's Campaign Forum (WCF) President Sam Bennett. The nonpartisan group sponsored the research. "Up to now it's been open game season for bloggers, for reporters, for opponents to [make sexist attacks]. Now, it's going to boomerang on you."

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Political consultants have said for decades that responding to sexist attacks only magnifies them or makes a candidate seem whiny. This research, however, turns that conventional wisdom on its head. Even mild sexist attacks, like calling a woman candidate an "ice queen," causes that candidate to lose as much support with voters as more flagrant sexism like the use of the word "whore." Women candidates can regain voters' support simply by pointing out that the attacks are sexist and inappropriate. (You can read more about the research here.)

"I think you're going to see a lot more candidates explore more aggressive responses," author of the research and Democratic strategist Celinda Lake said. "I think candidates were extremely worried about even mild sexism in the past, but everyone told them you have to take it and move on. My hope is what comes out of this research is ... by the next cycle candidates will have the freedom now to call it out and name it and change it."

In Krystal Ball's congressional bid in Virginia, the research has already changed the course of her race. When racy, six-year-old photos from a party surfaced on conservative websites, Ball's advisers told her to ignore them. They told her what Lake said she would have told a candidate even a year ago: Disregard the uproar over photos — or else risk coming across as whiny or drawing more attention to them.

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But Ball contacted Bennett at the WCF, and asked for advice.

"Her own instinct was to respond, while many on her campaign team were saying don't -- for the same reasons I would have said don't," Lake said.

Bennett told Ball to get out there and call the photos irrelevant and sexist, and she says Ball's handling of the issue has turned the heat up on her opponent, GOP Rep. Bob Wittman -- who says he had nothing to do with the photos surfacing -- and focused positive attention on Ball's campaign. Ball called the release of the photos a "sexist smear" and told young women not to let the way her photos were used deter them from running for office one day.

"This is a race that nobody was paying any attention to, even though she was doing a terrific job. Everyone's paying attention now, because she got out right in front of it and then pivoted beautifully and she got the media to pivot with her," Bennett said.

California GOP gubernatorial hopeful Meg Whitman has also received Bennett's advice. After news broke that an aide for Democratic rival Jerry Brown was inadvertently recorded calling Whitman a "whore," Whitman went on the attack. She called the word sexist and said in a debate with Brown that the term was offensive to all Californian women.

"We reached out, we forwarded the research to her and said, 'Here's what you need to do,' " Bennett said. "And she did, and she did a great job."

"Whitman had a base with independent and Democratic women that the whole nanny incident kind of damaged, and I think she's actually using this as a strategy to regain this base," Lake said. "It's an interesting question about how it will work."

What Lake's research doesn't tell us, however, is how a woman candidate should respond if another woman is the one lobbing a sexist remark her way. The president of the California branch of the liberal National Organization for Women (NOW) told a reporter she agreed with Brown that "political whore" is an accurate way to refer to Whitman because of her dealings with unions. (The national president of NOW called on Brown to fire the aide who used the word.)

Lake says her research only dealt with men making the sexist remarks about women. "I don't know ... but my instincts are it's a whole new day — and even if it's said by a woman, candidates can respond."

So far, Whitman's camp seems to be playing it safe. Whitman officials have not released a statement on the comment and have not returned repeated request for comment from The Upshot about the remark.

Bennett says she's also advised GOP Delaware Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell.

Lake and Bennett both say they are now slightly nostalgic for past campaigns they've advised, wishing they knew then what they know now. In Bennett's case, she wishes she had responded to the sexist attacks she endured while running for Congress in 2008. She looks back at all her "no comments" on degrading slurs with regret.

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For Lake, she thinks of Martha Coakley, the losing Democratic Senate candidate in Massachusetts, who was refereed to as "mean girl" and an "ice queen."

"What if we had had this in hand?" she asks. "There was one point in the campaign where we were all so disheartened by this that... the only solace we had is we kept this folder of sexist clips, which was quite large by the end of the campaign. And now I realize we could have been more aggressive about it. All of us collectively held back."

(Photo of Whitman: Getty)

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