Afternoon all. Our good friend John Della Volpe dropped by for a live session today to talk about the findings of the fall Harvard Institute Of Politics Youth Poll that was released this morning. I am grateful he was able to spend some time with us on roll out day!
As John discusses the most important finding in the poll, and something we can return to after the election, is the deep pessimism young people in America feel right now about the future. But for our purposes, 12 days out from the election, the big news here is 18-29 year olds who are likely to vote are favoring Democrats 63%-26%.
Here’s how that result would stack up against recent elections:
Yes, betrayed and abandoned by Trump and the Republicans, young people have for now swung heavily back towards the Democrats. Here’s John:
Simon, you know, I think if a couple of years ago I was going to tell you, after 2024 that in the next midterm, Democrats would be winning young men by 26 points, I think you take that. I think if I told you that Democrats would be winning non-college young people by 28 points, you’d take that. I think you’d take a 70-point margin for African Americans, a 35-point margin for the most elastic cohort within younger voters, of course, Hispanic, Latino voters. You can see this in our polling, and I think we can see this in some of the other secondary data sets that you and Tom [Bonier] and others are looking at these days.
As John tells us while young Democrats will be voting at about the same level as in recent elections, GOP youth intent has plummeted:
“Republicans are far less enthusiastic than Democrats. 54% and 51% of Democrats in the previous cycles said they were likely to turn out at this stage. And say it's 50%. It's about the same ballpark within the margin of error. For young Republicans, it went from 43% to 34%. Where there was once a five-point partisan gap, it's now a 16-point partisan gap, where Democrats are essentially 50% more likely to turn out in the midterms in the next couple of days and weeks.”
As John reminds us while young people are voting with us this election we have to work to do to earn their trust and should not be satisfied with this data:
After we wrapped up I went to TargetEarly to see how young people were performing in the early vote. Here’s a sample of what we found, with more to come on this in the coming days. It is remarkable that we are seeing both a surge of Hispanics and young people in the early vote, for these are groups full of irregular and non-voters:
And here’s my latest update into the Hispanic surge we are seeing in the early vote all across the country:
While all this data should leave us encouraged about what is going to happen in the election I will say, as a dad of three Gen Z kids, it is also a sobering reminder of how much work we have to do to make things better for the American people, put things right in this great country, and give young people in these United States the future they all deserve - Simon
John Della Volpe is the Director of Polling at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics, where he has led research initiatives on American youth since 2000. His work focuses on understanding the attitudes, values, and behaviors of young Americans and their impact on politics and public life.
A contributor to NBC, MSNBC, and The New York Times, John is the author of the critically acclaimed book Fight: How Gen Z is Channeling Their Fear and Passion to Save America (St. Martin’s Press, 2022).
An Eisenhower Fellow, John’s global research spans Asia, Europe, and beyond. He previously served on the U.S.-Russia Bilateral Presidential Commission on Media and continues to explore the intersection of public opinion, media, and democracy. He is also the executive producer of Power of Z and associate producer of De Slag om Florida (The Battle for Florida).
A graduate of the University of San Diego, John has been honored with its Author E. Hughes Career Achievement Award and holds an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Stonehill College.
