Trump gains ground with young men

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: Young men and the election.

Donald Trump gained support in almost every key demographic in this month’s election. One of the most notable was with young men, under age 30. In 2020, only 41% of that demographic voted for Donald Trump. This year? That number jumped to more than half to 56%.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: I wanted to know more about that swing and why it happened. Here’s what I found out.

FOX NEWS: “We can now also predict that Vice President Harris will win New Mexico…”

As election results rolled in on November 5th, it came as little surprise that voters ages 18 to 29 pulled the lever for Kamala Harris. Some polls prior to the election had put her up over President-elect Trump by nearly 30 points with that group.

Audio from Harris supporters on election day:

LINDSAY CRABTREE: I want my women's rights.

KATLYN JOHNSON: I like having my healthcare not being tampered with. I'm a firm believer in abortion rights and women's rights.

BENJAMIN BROWN: As long as she can speak coherently and doesn't constantly insult people I'm cool with it

But what surprised many people was how far off those predictions ended up being. The Associated Press reports Harris won just 51% of under-30 voters, to Trump’s 47%. Compared to 2020, it’s a roughly ten point shift on either side.

Michael Coulter is a professor of political science at Grove City College who says that swing is noteworthy.

MICHAEL COULTER: Typically, the youth vote is clearly strongly and more strongly for the Democratic candidate. This is the narrowest margin in that youth vote group in to my knowledge, maybe ever, but it's been certainly a long time.

Coulter notes that the swing among young men was even more dramatic. While 60% of young women voted for Harris, under-30 men went the other way by nearly as much.

COULTER: For young men, and I think this may be one of the more important stories of the election, is that 42% of that group voted for Kamala Harris and 56% for Donald Trump and and that's what you have in the young men, you know, ages 18 to 29 it's a complete switch.

Coulter says young men are usually a less reliable voter bloc, yet they turned out– and favored Trump. Why?

ALEXANDER WARREN: It's not surprising that, you know, young men just don't care about, the Democratic Party, because the Democrat Party doesn't talk to them.

That’s Alexander Warren. He’s 22, and the president of the College Republicans at Kennesaw State University in Georgia. He says college students do notice practical issues like the economy. They may not be looking at mortgages, but they realize how much it costs to, say, go out with friends.

Additionally, he says they notice the effects of illegal immigration and crime , too. Audio from WSB-TV in Atlanta.

NEWSCAST CLIP: Breaking news: the man who police say killed Laken Riley could be booked into the Clarke County jail at any minute…

Warren says it hit home for many of his peers when Laken Riley was allegedly killed by an illegal immigrant at the University of Georgia earlier this year.

WARREN: I think people are going to be emotional over that, rightfully so. And that, I think, really motivated a lot of young people in Georgia, because, you know, if that could easily be any one of them.

Warren thinks Trump appealed to young men for a couple of reasons. One was his communication style.

WARREN: I think a lot of people just appreciate his bluntness. I would say that that's a big factor. They like that he just tells it like it is, you know, he's not very, he's not a polished guy.

Another part of Trump’s appeal? His willingness to engage with young men.

Unlike Harris, Trump actively reached out to young men. He talked to some of the most popular podcast hosts today: former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson, podcaster and comedian Theo Von. He spent nearly three hours talking to Joe Rogan, who has the number one podcast in the country. Media Monitor says Rogan’s listener base is 71% male, with an average age of 24.

Nicholas Giordano, who teaches political science at Suffolk Community College in New York, says he understands why young men would feel drawn to that.

NICHOLAS GIORDAN: Well, it's simple actually, because young men, and men in general, have been demonized.

He says the young men he sees on college campuses feel disaffected, underappreciated.

GIORDANO: The Republican Party has made significant overtures, saying that, hey, listen, we do believe that they're men and women, and both play vital roles in our society, that we need both of them in order to succeed, and I think that males are gravitating towards that message.

It’s a message that seems to have been successful in 2024–but will these same young men retain their affinity for conservative politics? Michael Coulter at Grove City says it’s possible this will be more than a passing blip.

COULTER: Yeah, well, one of the things that is incredibly important part of American political life is when people form partisan attachments. And there is a fair amount of data that shows that this younger period is when you shape your partisan attachment and it sticks with you. People change. But I would expect most of these younger male voters, to stay Republican for at least a couple of election cycles, if not more. And and so the the Democrats are gonna have to figure out, like, if they want to win, they do need to find a way to better appeal to to younger male voters.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.