Commentary: Don't assume how women will vote this year

By Sarah Chamberlain

For women voters, there's really no getting around it:

The candidacy of Donald Trump is an issue, but not in any traditional sense.

Alternatively, the one name that didn't come up at the recent Republican Main Street Partnership (RMSP) roundtable at Villanova was Hillary Clinton's.

Going into next week's Republican convention, Trump can go a long way to courting the votes he needs to win in November.

As RMSP is fond of reminding people - women's issues are voters' issues.

And while Trump is no exception - inspiring both anger and adoration in the women voters we talk to - he is hardly the only thing women are thinking about as they begin to consider how they will vote in November.

As part of the RMSP's efforts to hear from the women who will decide who becomes the next leader of the free world - never forget that women are 53 percent of the electorate - I have been traveling around the country with members of Congress, holding women-only roundtables, and hearing the hopes and concerns of a critical constituency as part of the Women2Women tour.

At one of these events, in June at Villanova University, representing the crucial swing counties outside Philadelphia, I was reminded again of the issues that women care about this year.

And yes, Trump is one of those issues.

Like the Republican Party as a whole, women voters are largely undecided on what to make of Trump's candidacy.

And like the Republican Party as a whole, considerations other than Trump's history of colorful statements will decide how women vote.

The future of the Supreme Court is important to our voters, and quite a few of them see Trump as the only way to ensure conservative justices sit on the bench.

Keeping the House and Senate in Republican hands is of paramount importance to our voters, and they want to know how we're going to educate the electorate about the need to work hard for down-ballot Republicans.

Beyond the politics, women are looking at the same issues men are, ranking the rise of ISIS and national security as Issue 1A and the economy and jobs as Issue 1B.

Terrorism has been brought up at every stop on the Women2Women tour. Sadly, it is an issue that is not going away, and it's not a stretch to assume that those concerns will drive a lot of decisions in November.

The horrifying rise of opiate addiction and the treatment of mental illness are paramount issues for us. Our voters cheered recently when we talked about the upcoming mental-health bill in Congress.

Our issues are American issues, and we will make up our minds about the candidates based on how they plan to address those issues.

Sarah Chamberlain is the president of the Republican Main Street Partnership in Washington. To learn more, visit www.mainstreetadvocacy.com/women2women.