MILWAUKEE — Young people provided a glimmer of hope on the outskirts of the 2024 Republican National Convention, which was dominated each night by speeches riddled with pessimism, inaccuracies and scaremongering.
Several dozen high school and college students gathered Wednesday a half-mile from the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, where the RNC is being held, to discuss ways to communicate and organize around their vision of the future.
Youth VoteFest, organized by the University of Chicago Institute of Politics, aimed to create a space where teens and teenage adults could learn more about civic engagement and voter mobilization without partisan rhetoric, said Zeenat Rahman, executive director of the institute.
“We want the young people who are here today to know that they have a role in the political process,” Rahman said.
Mostly Republican Programming
The event was opened by former Democratic Senator Heidi Heitkamp, who represented North Dakota from 2013 to 2019.
But the program that followed included a fiery speech from a conservative environmentalist, remarks on the complex career move of an Indiana GOP official, a motivational speech from a conservative sports talk show host and a question-and-answer session with former U.S. Rep. Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, a Republican who now hosts “Sunday Night in America” on Fox News.
The organization plans to repeat the event in August at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, inviting a modern group of speakers.
Myiah Waddy, a 17-year-old Milwaukee native who recently graduated from the Obama School of Career and Technical Education, said she came to the event to “speak out” on the changes she would like to see in her community.
“I want to see a difference in my community, and by that I mean violence, education and empowering us as young people to be more involved. I don’t see many people my age getting involved in that,” said Waddy, who plans to study early childhood education at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.
Heitkamp addressed the issue, telling students attending the event that they represent thousands of teenage people who are not engaged in society.
“They don’t know why they should care. They certainly don’t see two people at the top of the list who look like you, who in some way live your experience every day. And so I think there’s a certain level of cynicism. And, you know, we can’t succeed in this democracy unless we all participate,” Heitkamp said.
Student vote
Clarissa Unger, co-founder and executive director of Students Learn Students Vote Coalition, said that “student voting has never been more important.” Citing Statistical from Tufts University showing that the percentage of college-age people is actually growing — rising to 66% in 2020 — Unger said students have a chance to make a change.
Unger set the ground rules for the day – that no form of political division would be tolerated during the discussions.
“We understand and appreciate where we are and what will happen in the future, and we are not asking anyone to sacrifice their personal partisan identity, but the actions today in this space will be nonpartisan,” Unger said.
Students participated in three workshops on how to strengthen non-partisan election campaigns on college campuses, how to make democracy attractive and fun, and how to deal with polarization in the 2024 presidential election.
Oscar Allen, a 17-year-old senior at Bronx High School of Science in New York City, said he and a friend organized their own election campaign last year for high school students turning 18.
“We decided that with the 2024 election coming up, a lot of high school kids are actually coming of age to vote without even realizing it. And those people might not have the opportunity to vote and actually do their civic duty for the first time in their lives,” said Allen, who titled the project VOTE, or Vote of Teens in Elections.
Allen said he considers himself a moderate politician after watching his father, a staunch Republican, and his mother, a progressive Japanese immigrant, argue about politics.
“There was a family conflict that I always had to deal with from a very young age, when I was about 9 years old, when I didn’t know what was going on. And I really wanted to promote harmony and happiness for our family as a whole. And I think I carried that perspective into my adult life, even with my own ideologies,” Allen said.
“The political conflict is turning into violent conflicts full of rhetoric full of venom that is just unnecessary because at the end of the day, everyone wants the same harmony,” Allen said, adding that he feared further violence following Saturday’s assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania.
Stand up to the politicians
Benjamin “Benji” Backer, the 26-year-old founder and executive chairman of the American Conservation Coalition, encouraged students to question the rhetoric used by today’s politicians.
“We call for unity after the horrific events in Pennsylvania, but it is politicians who have brought us to this point, to division,” Backer said.
Backer said the system needs to be restarted.
“We’ve reached a point where things like the environment and climate change are partisan. The dangers of partisanship, the two-party system that’s leading us to destruction, have to end,” Backer said.
Gowdy concluded the show by talking about friendships across the aisle while he was in the House of Representatives, as well as his enduring friendship with former Democratic U.S. Representative Joseph Kennedy of Massachusetts and his current relationship with Democratic U.S. Senator Peter Welch of Vermont.
“I’m one fact away from changing my mind,” Gowdy said. He gave students examples of instances where former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii changed her mind about the need for a citizen advocate in the Foreign Intelligence Court. He also told students of his “great affection” for Hakeem Jeffries, now the House minority leader.
“We have to get beyond the notion that the fact that we disagree about the size and scope of government or the role of government is the only thing that matters in life,” Gowdy said. “There are many things that matter more than that.”
Conservative Groups and Youth Voices
Other youth vote organizations were present on the convention grounds and at the RNC.
The Young America Foundation handed out flyers from a table set up in front of the Moms for Liberty City Hall building Tuesday at the Bradley Symphony Center, five blocks from the conference room.
The group’s home page has a vast message: “Feel out of place as a conservative at your school? There is room
for you here.”
The group did not respond to an interview request Wednesday.
Charlie Kirk, founder and president of Turning Point USA, was given the opportunity to speak Monday evening at the convention.
Kirk, whose organization promotes confined government and free markets in high schools and on college campuses, said Gen Z does not have to accept a “mutilated version of the American dream” that he said was created by President Joe Biden.
“Donald Trump is on a rescue mission to restore your birthright, the one your grandfathers and those before them gave you in full,” he said. “And listen carefully, this is why young men are the most conservative they’ve been in 50 years. To all the Gen Zers watching this convention on TikTok right now, I have a message just for you: You don’t have to stay poor.”
Daniel Cox, director of the Center for the Study of American Life at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, he said CNN found in June that “there is little evidence that young men are more likely to identify as conservatives, but they do appear to be growing affinity for a Republican identity.”
Kirk is the author of “Right Wing Revolution: How to Beat the Woke and Save the West.”
