CNN's Chris Cuomo asserted that “it's just hard” for male politicians to navigate “the female agenda” that female candidates may put forward in campaigns. 

On the June 10 edition of New Day, co-hosts Brooke Baldwin and Chris Cuomo spoke with Politico's Maggie Haberman about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's book tour to promote her new book Hard Choices. Jumping off a discussion of Clinton's efforts to deal with gender in the 2008 campaign and the possibility that she might become the first female president, Cuomo asserted that male politicians may have a hard time dealing with “the female agenda,” because “what is the guy supposed say?”: (emphasis added)

HABERMAN: It was not that she didn't address it enough, as she put it last night in that interview, she really didn't address it at all in the 2008 race. She did not run a gender-based candidacy. Her campaign was very concerned about a projection of weakness. The demographics have shifted enough, and also I think that the voter attitudes have shifted enough about a female president, that she knows this is essentially - she would be carrying the mantel as first female president. That's going to be very meaningful for a lot of woman. That's going to be significant. She's not going to shy away from it.

CUOMO: I'll tell you, it's just hard to deal with as a male candidate. You know? Whatever Hillary or any female candidate wants to put forward as a female agenda, right? Not even feminist agenda, just female agenda. What is the guy supposed to say? 'Oh, I'm taking issue with that?' 'Oh, I want to be that also?' You know, I just think -- it's just smart politics, and you can very much argue it's come to be that time, you know?

Of course, numerous male politicians have successfully advocated for women's issues. For example, NARAL's list of endorsed candidates for the 2014 elections includes more than 30 male candidates whom the organization has deemed to be “pro-choice champions.”