Black Voters Face Generational Gap as Young People Are Disconnected: NPR

Jen Iro, a 34-year-old from Texas, has struggled with the current state of American politics. The last time she voted was for former President Barack Obama, and she doesn’t think she’ll vote again this year.

“[Politics are] “It’s not really important to me because at the moment it seems to be getting worse and worse, which makes me even more uninterested,” Iro explained.

Iro is one of a growing number of young eligible voters who feel disconnected from politics and unable to identify with a political party. With a lack of affordable housing, climate change and rising costs, some millennials and Gen Zers feel hopeless about a political system they don’t believe has met their needs.

Generally, young voters and black voters tend to vote Democrat. In 2020, 92% of black voters voted for President Biden, while only 8% supported former President Donald Trump.

However, there appears to be a shift within the black electorate that has broadened over the years. According to Pew Research7% of black voters over 50 currently identify or lean Republican, while 17% of black voters under 50 align with the Republican Party. It’s unclear how Vice President Harris, as a Democratic presidential hopeful, will fare with this group.

People tend to become more conservative as they age. But among black voters, the younger generations may be the most conservative. In a crucial election year, this conservative shift could impact the next presidential election.

About 40 million Gen Zers will be able to vote in November. Of those 40 million, nearly half are young people of color, including nearly 6 million young Black people.

Christopher Towler is investigating why Iro and other young black voters feel disconnected from politics. He is an associate professor at California State University, Sacramento and a principal investigator for the Black Voter Project.

“[Black voters] “They understand the importance of elections,” Towler said. “They understand what it means to have representation. But at the same time, they don’t necessarily feel like they’re represented by either party right now.”

Towler thinks many African Americans who are less likely to vote, or vote less consistently, don’t see what politicians and parties claim are “victories” for the black community impacting their individual lives. People may not see more opportunities for themselves, as the Biden administration often touts, including reducing black unemployment or increasing loans and grants for black small businesses.

“I think there’s a general feeling that they want something to support, they really understand the importance of this moment,” Towler said. “But at the same time, they’re not necessarily confident that their vote is going to change much.”

As part of the 2024 Black Voter Project national surveyTowler examined the level of Republican support among young voters.

“From the data I’ve collected, the highest percentage of blacks who say they’ll vote for Trump are 18 to 29-year-olds, with about 22 percent saying they’ll vote for Trump,” Towler explained. “They’re also the least supportive of the Democratic Party.”

Towler thinks this may partly stem from young people seeing the civil rights movement as a distant event.

“We’re entering generations of young black voters who are not just once, but maybe two or three times removed from a civil rights generation,” Towler said. “The way they form their identity is less likely to be directly tied to the civil rights struggle… they’re less likely to be suspicious of political institutions and more likely to support Trump and Republicans.”

Bernard Fraga, an associate professor at Emory University, has also noticed this shift. For Fraga, this is simply a new era of black voters.

“The narrative that Democrats somehow own the issue of change, like the idea that people want things to be different than they are now, is something that’s been true for a long time,” Fraga said. “Now, there are some people in the electorate, especially young people, who see the Republican Party as representing change.”

RC Maxwell, a 35-year-old Republican from Arizona, has seen a lot of changes within the party over the years. He doesn’t recall seeing much conservative outreach to young voters or voters of color before Donald Trump ran for president in 2015. Now, Maxwell says, the party is reaching out directly to those groups.

He also noted that an increasing number of young people are turning to the Republican Party because they are looking for economic opportunity.

“We want prosperity, we want secure borders, and we want the American dream,” Maxwell said. “And only the Republican Party is talking about that message because they have policies in terms of limited government. Drill, baby, drill..”

Kiah Hopkins is a 20-year-old from Georgia who plans to vote Democratic in November, but she knows people her age who lean Republican or are considering a third-party candidate.

“The thing I hear a lot is if someone is really conservative, they really like how Republicans are handling the economy,” Hopkins said. “Usually, with social issues, they tend to be more progressive. At least, like my friends who are maybe in the middle or lean conservative, they’ll be more progressive on social issues and more conservative on the economy.”

She says she has heard many of her peers say they don’t plan to vote in the presidential election, and that worries her.

“For people to say they don’t vote, it scares me just because this is a privilege that we have, that our ancestors were able to fight for,” Hopkins said.