Approval/Disapproval Polls
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superrific
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Could be politically more conservative if not overall more conservative. But these micro-shifts are not uncommon. People born in 1958 were way, way more likely to be GOPers than people born in 1953.
I am not ruling out the possibility that it could be true, just that I would need to see a heck of a lot more data for believing that it is true.
One of my 100 theories on this would be that 18-21 year olds have had less time away from their parents and are therefore more likely to hew to their parents' political preferences, whereas 22-29 year olds have had more time to be influenced by peers without any countervailing parental influence.
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“… Older men like Trump on net, too, though young men’s approval has been stronger on average over the past few months. And relative to women their own age, young men’s affection for Trump is especially striking — that is, the gender gap is much greater among the young.
… “A lot of young men had the sense that the Democrats didn’t see them as having problems,” Reeves said. “They saw them as being the problem.”
Yet in many ways, men are faring worse than their female peers. Young men have lower academic achievement. They’re more likely to still live with their parents. They suffer more deaths caused by opioid overdoses and suicide. Younger White men from low-income households in particular are worse off than their fathers by most economic and social measures.
… That’s arguably how Trump won over young men, too: less with his policies and more with his macho affect and his ability to help isolated young men feel welcome and liked. After all, Trump’s agenda has done little to address the economic and mental health challenges young men face. Indeed, Reeves says American men’s policy preferences haven’t changed much in recent years. ….”
superrific
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But that wouldn't explain the recent emergence. To my knowledge, there hasn't been a split like this in a while. Which could be a point in your favor. It could also suggest that something about this specific moment (as others mentioned, pandemic and algorithm) is creating this effect.
What is clear, I think, is that Kamala did worse among young voters than recent Dem candidates. So something happened in those four years. Either the new entrants to the cohort are different, or the cohort changed its mind.
One thing I sometimes worry about is, ironically, what JD Vance worries about: birth rates. Not in the same way, of course. I worry that the fundamentalists will outbreed the rationalists. I think that was one significant factor in the right-wing radicalization of Israel.
Religious folk have always been more conservative than secularists; it balanced out when the kids of religious people would go to school and learn what their parents didn't tell them. Liberals had two kids and both were likely liberal; conservatives would have 7 but three would become liberal. Well, that was before Hillsdale college and home-schooling with Prager U materials and states that fund religious indoctrination centers, I'm sorry, charter schools. If we're only going to pick off 1 of those 7, we're going to need more kids. Unfortunately, liberals are so much more likely to be childless or have small families.
I give a couple of my friends shit about this sometime. I say, "I've done my part for the cause -- I'm sending three liberals out into the world. What about you?"
I like cross-checking demographic data with the Roper Center, which maintains historical exit polling data (link below)
Here are the Demo shifts from 2020 to 2024
18-29 +6R (12 points combined)
30-44 +1R (2 points combined)
45-64 +4R (8 points combined)
65-dead -3R (-6 points combined)
So, it is true that the 18-29 swung the most to Trump of any demographic, but that is largely a function of there be so many gettable votes in that demo. In other words, 18-29 is the most pro-democratic of any age group. Thus, it is much easier to have a large +R swing with that demo, and much harder to have a +D swing (the same way it easier for democrats to pick up seats in the Senate when there are 23 republican seats up for grabs and only 10 democratic seats).
Getting the 45-64 year olds to move from 49% Biden to 45% Biden is about the same as getting the 18-29 year olds to move from 60% Biden to 54% Biden (particularly when you realize that there are more than 2x as many voters in the 45-64 category).
In general, I think it is likely that the 18-29 demo is more swingy than the 30-44 demo. But I don't have the time to go through all the Roper data right now.
How Groups Voted in 2020 | Roper Center for Public Opinion Research
TypeDemographicGroupBidenTrumpSEXMen484553Women525742RACEWhite674158African-American138712Hispanic
How Groups Voted in 2024 | Roper Center for Public Opinion Research
TypeDemographicGroupHarrisTrumpSEXMen474355Women535345RACEWhite714257African-American118613Hispanic
Duke Mu
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Young men in the Joe Rogan podcastosphere. Dems had a massive ground game going. How 20th Century quaint! And the Jen O'Malley albatross handed off to Harris by Mumblestilsken.
Trump had virtually NO ground game, just Lies, multimedia megaphones, and podcasts. A huge advantage in the numbers game.
Dems are incompetent at campaigning.
Trump is incompetent and maleficent at governing.
What a nice little dystopia we have.
superrific
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The fact that the 30-44 swung less to Trump than 18-29 or 45-64 is evidence for my point, albeit indirectly.
If my theory is right and there is a cluster of Obama-raised voters who are extremely liberal, then some of them aged out of 18-29 -- and aged into 30-44. So they were replaced by conservatives 18-21, and they replaced conservatives who aged out of the 30-44 category and into 45-64. Thus would the 30-44 group show less of a change -- the entry of new liberals balancing out the shift to Trump of those already there.
If my theory is right and there is a cluster of Obama-raised voters who are extremely liberal, then some of them aged out of 18-29 -- and aged into 30-44. So they were replaced by conservatives 18-21, and they replaced conservatives who aged out of the 30-44 category and into 45-64. Thus would the 30-44 group show less of a change -- the entry of new liberals balancing out the shift to Trump of those already there.
Here is how the 18-29 demo has voted this millenium:
2000 +2 Gore
2004 +8 Kerry
2008 +34 Obama
2012 +23 Obama
2016 +19 Clinton
2020 +24 Biden
2024 +11 Harris
It seems that the Obama bump has subsided and that the youth vote is more in line with pre-Obama numbers.
superrific
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Maybe, although I'm not sure 2024 can be treated as part of a trend.
The way political allegiance typically works, from what I've read, is that early preferences are persistent. Once a Dem, always a Dem (to a first approximation). So those Obama +34 voters in 2008 are probably still pretty close to Obama +34. They are just of a different age now.
That said, it's also true that young people can be a bit more volatile, especially the youngest ones who haven't necessarily landed on a stable political identity.
They may be Obama +34, but unfortunately, they aren't Harris +34 or Biden +34.
Maybe we need to bring Obama out of retirement for the Trump vs. Obama vs. the 22nd amendment.
superrific
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But that's what I'm saying. It's very likely not quite +34 any more, but it's entirely possible for kids who couldn't vote in 2004 to be radically pro-Obama in 2008. If your political consciousness began in 2004, what the fuck would attract you to the GOP? And they have probably maintained that partisanship, almost, since. It's just that they might get lost in other data.
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Love it !!!
If SCOTUS were to give a thumbs up on a 3rd term president ? Then that paves the way for the GPOAT to once again save our country from economic disaster, restore our reputation around the globe, and secure our democratic republic for another four years.
C-Money
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I wish.
Obama likely wouldn't play along, but if he committed to running again if the 22nd amendment were repealed, I'd think there would be a 50/50 shot you could get 38 states to repeal the 22nd amendment.
aGDevil2k
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Or maybe they just want someone who isn't on death's door as president. And by the time Harris got in, it was already all about Biden
That is my view. I think @superrific discounts candidate quality/exogenous circumstances a bit too much for my tastes. Certainly, young people are regressing a little more to the mean politically, but I think there is a tendency to overstate societal trends and to understate economic/candidate quality.
But housing costs aren't crushing 18-21 year olds, and only sort of 22-29 year olds. They are hurting 30-44 year olds the most of all, and those people hardly budged from 2020.