Summary
Despite his conservative platform, Donald Trump made unexpected gains among Gen Z voters. Exit polls showed a shift, with young men favoring Trump by 2 points, a reversal from Biden’s previous lead.
Gen Z’s support for Trump may have been underestimated, as an Axios poll found nearly half of Gen Z voters lied about their vote, with young men more likely to support Trump quietly.
Trump connected with young men through appearances on popular podcasts and endorsements from social media influencers.
Disillusionment with the economy and frustration with the Democratic Party’s approach to working-class issues also drove some Gen Z voters to seek change, with Trump capitalizing on these sentiments.
Just a few years ago this generation was walking out of schools to protest our lack of action against climate change. The shift is crazy.
It was mostly the girls doing that, and they haven’t gone as hard right.
I actually disagree. They’re the same kids. The problem isn’t that this is a different demographic, or even that the same demographic has suddenly become malicious and ill-meaning. It’s that that’s not how they see Trump. They’re not as educated on his past actions, being too young to vote and therefore too young to care during the 2016 or even the 2020 election cycle. They’re bombarded day-in, day-out by news media and social media giving them conflicting information. For many of them, their beliefs boil down to “well, my parents seem to think Trump is good for the economy, and there’s too much other stuff to pick through,” and a single-issue voter is born.
Others are simply tired of standing for morally and ethically good issues, only to be constantly told that, as young men or white people, they’re the issue. When you fight for someone else for so long and are still met with people who blame you for being born just because you seek a deeper understanding (as one 16 year old student in my class recently did when he tried to ask what the problems with Trump genuinely are), it becomes easy to fall into the political sports team paradigm.
And these are far from the only two reasons. But we have to try an understand that the same students who want the environment saved are the ones who vote Trump, because no other option speaks to them.