HERSHEY, Pa. – Erika Jackson, 22, is sick of being told she "doesn't look like a Trump supporter."
"People definitely judge me more harshly," said the recent graduate of Temple University in Philadelphia. "Isn't the whole point that women can speak our own minds? Why is it only OK if it's liberal, or if we support Hillary?"
If Donald Trump loses Tuesday, it will be in part because he's losing college-educated young white women by 27 points, a bloc that Mitt Romney won with 52 percent in 2012.
Yet there are young women who back Trump. And interviews with about two dozen this weekend revealed a range of reasons and resentment that they should be expected to vote one way because of their age and gender. They say the election has celebrated young women and political engagement, but only if "it's supporting liberal policies and Hillary," Jackson said.
"The legacy of having a woman president doesn't need to be Hillary Clinton," said Amanda Rider, a 19-year-old student from Harrisburg, Pa., interviewed at a Trump rally Friday in Hershey, Pa.
Young women at Trump's rally said it was unfair to feel social pressure just for voting their conscience.
"I would absolutely love to have a woman president, just not Hillary Clinton," said Elisa Seiple, a 28-year-old photographer from Easton, Pa. A mother of two young children, she said abortion was an important issue for her and made for an easy choice.
"It's simple — she doesn't share any of the same core values that I share, and I couldn't support someone like that," Seiple said.
