ICE is giving them less big booty Latinas to look at.

Jk. I’m stupid. Have no idea.

Young yankee men are treatlerites, and Trump made the treats expensive.

Most of us USAians don’t have a coherent political ideology or project we support. There’s a vague notion of things and a general “vibe” of who you’re supposed to vote for that supports the vibe.

A vote for Trump may have been a “ive always been told to vote for a Republican” by my voting parents… and the consequences of actively doing a thing to support the very well telegraphed outcomes of a second Trump presidency may actually result in the shocking revelation that “holy shit! who I vote for actually matters”. It might have been a “I vote for the opposite party that I voted for last time” or even a “I just go down the ballot and alternate ‘D’ and ‘R’ no matter the candidate or race”.

When the Democratic candidates wins don’t result in things getting better, there’s no reason to think that those same young voters won’t sit out the vote or vote “R” in 2028.

It’s pretty simple. Trump and the chuds tried too hard too be ‘cool’, told everyone that they were ‘cool’ and therefore they are not actually cool.

Most young people, including young white men, are on the left, if they are political at all. You can know this by going to literally any bar. I will guarantee you that your local white fuck-boi illiterate plug has probably had an interesting conversation on the benefits of anarchism within the last couple of years. Now, mind you, alot of this inevitably boils down to NATO-anarchism, but that is ‘technically’ opposing the Republicans, so they will vote that way.

Real young rightwing political types are extremely rare, and usually considered to be extremely annoying to everyone around them, even if they are personally successful. If anything, chuds feeling comfortable with being ‘out and proud’ has made them fail the extremely important ‘be normal’ test.

My theory is that America is deteriorating, neither party can govern, so it’s gonna be only one term presidencies from hear on out as people just vote against whose in power.

There’s all these things where the Trump movement promised to deliver for young men, white young men in particular. None of it materialized. Instead, the social environment became more hostile towards them and they’ve suffered for it. Jobs they wanted are gobbled up by AI while Trump cozies up to the CEOs of big tech. Everything is more expensive for them. Porn was banned in a lot of places by Republicans (Florida requires your real ID to look at porn). The Iran/Israel stuff. “Ending DEI” was supposed to open door in college-educated fields and instead women are now more employable than men coming out of college. Just a lot of general foolishness from their so-called leaders that’s optically embarrassing.

The nouveau-fash movement that seemed gold has lost it’s luster. Some have moved on to the proper fascism of Fuentes. Some have properly seen the light and switched sides. Most have simply lost heart and are left with resentment and suppressed anger, which we will have to reckon with at some point. Something we probably won’t do as a society correctly which will have devastating long term consequences.

I can’t speak for young men but it must of been shocking when it turned out that all of the things older folks said Republicans were lying about, Republicans were in fact lying about.

I think we underestimate how fucking bad Biden was.

Imagine your Gen Z. Your late teens or early 20s were spent in lockdowns. You followed the rules while boomers spat at you. You saw Biden support open genocide in Gaza. The economy started sliding and your cohort was the group that got impacted by this. Housing isn’t even a dream you’d be happy if you can afford rent in a share house.

The Dems ran Kamala and her promise was that “ummm nothing much will really change.”

The Dems were betting that outrage against Trump would allow them to be pure neolib Zionists who did absolutely fucking nothing for young people, or most people.

Was it ever really the case that Gen Z was swinging right? Or was it more that the “center left” was offering literally nothing at all.

I’m not saying economic anxiety made them groypers. I think the groypers are right wing and not simply victims of the economy.

I think it’s more that politics offered Gen Z absolutely fucking nothing so most of them switched off, and the only ones who were switched on were the groypers.

Like… most of them simply went neutral. They didn’t see any outcome worth supporting in politics. The only politically engaged Gen Z were the ones who find white supremacy and patriarchy appealing so they were the ones to paint the picture.

a LOT of people sat out the election the last two times, can’t be understated.

right now the number one animating issue for the average american labor aristocrat is probably gas prices

I don’t think there’s any Hitler Youth force for republicans after Charlie Kirk’s assassination. The right’s podcasters started infighting and disowning Trump over the war, a lot of the ones with younger audiences turned critical of Israel, and students are graduating into the worst job market and economy since the 1930s. I would be so disillusioned right now if I was a groyper and Trump spent the past six months talking about his ballroom renovations.

You have to also consider what this actually measures, which is the change in the margins from 2024 presidential race, to this year’s midterms. There was massive turnout for that race, and in some cases a lot of same-day registrations. It varies from place to place, sure, but that arrow represents (to my understanding) the swing between the previous margin. So, if the previous margin was say, D+4 and this time its D+24 (which is found by doing D % - R %), then the swing is D+4-D+24 = D+20. This says nothing about turnout, however.

Let’s imagine two groups of voters who never change their minds (100% of Democrats always vote D, 100% of Republicans always vote R). The only thing that changes is who shows up.

2024 (The High-Turnout Presidential Year): 1,000 Democrats show up and vote D. 1,000 Republicans show up and vote R.

• Total voters = 2,000
• The split is 50% D / 50%
• 2024 Margin: A perfect tie, or 0.

2026 (The Lower-Turnout Midterm): Democrats are fired up. All 1,000 show up again and vote D. Republicans are uninspired. Only 500 show up and vote R.

• Total voters = 1,500.
• The split is now 66.6% D / 33.3% R.
• 2026 Margin: (D66.6 - R33.3) = D+33.

The “Swing”: 2026 Margin (D+33) minus 2024 Margin (0) = D+33 Swing.

The map shows a massive 33-point swing toward the Democrats. But look at the raw numbers: Not a single person changed their mind. Every single person who showed up voted the same way they did two years prior. The entire “swing” was just 500 Republicans deciding to stay home.

Now the only reason I mention this is that some of these massive swings can be explained by lower turnout for one party over another. I live in a college town, and my town went red for our state’s governor even though it historically votes blue. However, our same day registration for voters was almost 1000 people less this year, and same-day registrations are overwhelmingly from the student body, which typically votes Democrat. Our map is fucked, and it shows a massive red arrow because in 2024 our town was like D+46 for Harris. This time around, though, we don’t have the same level of turnout for students, and the race was actually a lot closer between Democrats and Republicans.

The question you have to ask is, was there a massive reduction of voters within that age bracket that can explain why its +34 for Dems this cycle.

Among the other (probably much bigger) reasons in this thread: there’s a war on and the idea of the draft floating around.

people will say boring answers like gas and ram prices, but it is because dems embraced transphobia, deportations and police funding - my latest for jacobin

gas prices

Whole map is “No estimate” with 48 states having a single exception who voted “More Dem.”.