Should abortion be legal? The gender divide is at record-high, poll finds
On the subject of abortion, men and women have never been more divided, according to new polling.
A recent Gallup survey revealed record gender gaps among Americans when it came to opinions about the politics, legality and morals of abortion, an issue that has long sparked significant disagreement.
The poll — which sampled 1,003 U.S. adults May 1-18 — comes three years after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in the Dobbs decision, ending the constitutional right to an abortion, which had been in place for nearly 50 years. Prior to this decision, men and women were largely aligned in their views on abortion.
Record gender gaps
The largest divide came on the question of being pro-choice or not.
A strong majority of women, 61%, said they were pro-choice, while 41% of men said the same, marking a 20-point difference — and the biggest on record since Gallup began tracking abortion views in 1995.
By comparison, in 2024, these figures stood at 63% and 45%, respectively. And prior to the high court's reversal of Roe v. Wade, the shares of men and women who identified as pro-choice were more closely aligned. In 2021, they stood at 52% for women and 45% for men.
A similar, but slightly smaller gap was found on the topic of the moral acceptability of abortion.
Most women, 57%, said abortion is morally acceptable, while 40% of men said the same, resulting in a 17-point gender divide.
Last year, these figures stood at 60% and 47% — a 13-point difference. And, before 2022, they were often within a few points of one another.
Lastly, 56% of women said that abortion should be legal in any or most circumstances. Meanwhile, 41% of men said the same, marking a 15-point gap.
In 2024, 57% of women said it should be legal all or most of the time, while 44% of men said the same, resulting in a 13-point difference. Once again, this divide was significantly smaller in the years before the national right to an abortion was overturned.
Partisan differences
The poll — which has a margin of error of 4 percentage points — also revealed massive partisan differences on the subject of abortion.
The vast majority of Democrats, 78%, said abortion is morally acceptable, which is down from a record-high 83% in 2024. Still it is far above the 63% who said the same in 2021, the year before Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Meanwhile, just 20% of Republicans described abortion as morally acceptable. This is the lowest share on record since 2011.
Similarly, 83% of Democrats said they identified as pro-choice, which is down slightly from the 88% high recorded in 2022.
In contrast, 16% of GOP respondents said they were pro-choice — the lowest share on record.
Americans overall
Among overall respondents, a slim majority, 51%, said they identified as pro-choice, which is down from an all-time high of 55% in 2022, but still above historic levels. Forty-three percent described themselves as pro-life.
Similarly, 49% said abortion is morally acceptable, while 40% said it is morally wrong. Prior to 2021, pluralities tended to say it is morally wrong.
Public opinion was more evenly divided on the legality of abortion, with 49% saying it should be legal under all or most circumstances and 48% saying it should be legal only in rare circumstances or illegal in all cases. Before 2021, majorities typically said it should be illegal or legal in few cases.
'Although some of the changes seen in 2022 have eased, the public opinion landscape remains more accepting of abortion than it was prior to Dobbs,' Gallup concluded.
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