Former CEO and Chairman of Hewlett Packard, Carly Fiorina sat down with the Washington Free Beacon to talk about the 2014 midterms and her efforts to engage female voters.
Fiorina founded a new group called the Unlocking Potential Project (UP Project) earlier this year. The group hopes to attract female voters to the Republican Party, but also seeks to combat what Fiorina sees as a concentrated and effective effort to categorize Republicans as anti-women.
"[Republicans have] been losing among women for too long, and the Democrats have been using this propaganda called the war on women for too long and unfortunately it’s working," Fiorina told the Free Beacon.
"So what we’re trying to do is engage women on the ground to have persuasive conservations with other women they know to first combat the war on women and then secondly to talk about all the issues that women care most about and because we’re half the nation, every issue is a women’s issue."
The UP Project is currently engaged in six races, one being Colorado—a place where so-called women’s issues became a focal point early in the campaign.
Sen. Mark Udall (D., Colo.) has attacked Republican Rep. Cory Gardner for "champion[ing] an eight-year crusade to outlaw birth control." The attack came from Gardner’s previous support of personhood amendments, amendments Gardner says he no longer supports.
Gardner has since come out in favor of making birth control available over the counter. The move gained attention and more GOP candidates have now endorsed it.
Fiorina sees it as a smart tactic, and told the Free Beacon it is not a contradictory position for Republicans to hold.
"I think it’s dangerous if it’s the only issue, which is kind of the way Democrats have played it. When Democrats launch their war on women ads all they talk about are those reproductive rights issues. I think it’s fine to say ‘actually it’s not true that Republicans want to deny women access to birth control,’ here’s an example—we support over the counter birth control, but what is true is that Democrats are denying access to women’s doctors and hospitals as a result of Obamacare," Fiorina said.
"In other words it shouldn’t be a single issue. It should be a way of combating a stereotype that’s just flat wrong, and an opportunity to then go on and talk about other issues that women care about."