Hillary Clinton has been trying to figure out how to connect with young voters since primary season began. Many millennials rallied around Bernie Sanders and seemed determined not to move their support behind the Democratic nominee. It turns out maybe all she needed to win their support, was for Donald Trump to win the Republican primary.
According to a piece by Ed Kilgore in New York Magazine, not only is Clinton beating Trump among millennial voters, she’s crushing him.
Mr. Kilgore cites several polls, including a recent USA Today/Rock the Vote poll which shows Clinton ahead of Trump by a whopping 56-20 margin.
He goes on to write that:
“While this survey has a larger sample of millennials than others, the numbers are not really out of line with what earlier polls have shown. The latest Economist/YouGov tracking poll has Clinton leading 59-27 among under-30 voters and 55-28 among those ages 30 to 44. The most recent ABC/Washington Post survey showed a more modest 52-40 Clinton lead among voters under 40, but there’s not much doubt about which way the wind is blowing.”
Interestingly enough, the same USA Today/Rock the Vote survey shows millennials identifying with the Democratic Party by a huge 50-20 margin. This fact could signal that Trump’s anger antics have not only driven young voters away from him, but also away from the entire Republican Party; a shift which could prove costly to the GOP for many elections to come.
USA Today points out that:
“Trump’s weakness among younger voters is unprecedented, lower even than the 32% of the vote that the Gallup Organization calculates Richard Nixon received among 18-to-29-year-old voters in 1972, an era of youthful protests against the Vietnam War.”
This is great news not only for Hillary Clinton, but for Americans everywhere who value in their presidential candidates, measured debate over juvenile invective.
Here is a video of the kind of unhinged supporters that Trump has attracted and goaded by his incendiary rhetoric. The fact that young people are rejecting this nonsense in droves, makes me hopeful for our future.
