by Manzanita Miller
Latest Harvard Youth Survey reveals that President Joe Biden has lost significantly in popularity among voters under 30 compared to four years ago, with a 20-point drop among young men. While young Americans give Biden low marks on foreign policy and economic issues, including inflation, housing and the labor market, immigration is a major factor in young people moving away from Democrats.
Biden currently leads Trump by thirteen percentage points (50 to 37 percent) among registered voters under thirty in the Harvard Youth Poll, a slightly larger lead than last year other latest polls which include young people as a subset.
Biden leads by just eight percentage points (45 to 37 percent), with 16 percent undecided among Americans under 30 who do not have access to voter registration. Among those classified as likely voters, Biden’s lead increases to nineteen points (56% to 37%).
These numbers are significantly lower than Biden’s lead in the Harvard Youth Poll conducted in spring 2020, when Biden led Trump by 23 points among young people overall (51-28%) and by 30 points (60-30%) among young people young likely voters.
Polling shows that much of the decline in support for Joe Biden is among young men. Biden has gone from a 26-point lead among men under 30 in 2020 to just a six-point lead in the current poll. Young women’s support for Biden has remained fairly stable, with Biden holding a 35-point lead among young women in 2020 and currently holding a comfortable 33-point lead.
Young men also identify as Democrats at much lower rates than during the 2020 election, with the percentage of young men identifying as Democrats and Republicans now almost equal. Just 32 percent of men under thirty identify as Democrats, down from 42 percent in 2020, a ten-point decline. Over the same period, the percentage of young men identifying as Republican increased nine percentage points from 20 percent in 2020 to 29 percent today. Among young women, Democrats scored six points.
Young men’s shift away from Democrats may have less to do with opposition to entitlement programs and government intervention and more to do with distrust of Democrats’ approach to issues like immigration, according to the poll.
While press release The poll mentions gender differences and states that “although party identification and self-identifying ideology show younger men moving from Democrats to Republicans and from liberals to conservatives, their views on the role of government have not changed as dramatically.” The press release went on to point out that most young men continue to support government efforts to reduce poverty and subsidized health care.
Young men’s economic views may not have changed significantly under some entitlement programs, but they have changed on an indicator that may be more critical to the average twenty-something than in previous years – immigration.
More than half of young men (51 percent) say immigration is more critical to them than all other issues. The survey asked, “As you think about the major issues facing the United States today, tell me which of the following two is more important to you: Immigration or all others,” and more than half of young men said immigration was most critical.
Young men, by a margin of 37 to 10 percent, also say that immigration has also worsened the U.S. economy. Interestingly, young women are less likely to agree, saying immigration has made the economy worse, by 31% to 9%.
Majorities of young voters across all racial groups say immigration is making the economy worse, with young whites saying this by a margin of 41 to 7 percent. Young Latinos say this by a 26 to 13 percent margin, and young Blacks say this by a 24 to 7 percent margin.
This is not the first time, or rather a recent case, that young people reject the leftist program of open borders Economist Poll/YouGov showed that young people outweigh 33 points of disapproval of Biden’s approach to immigration.
Democrats are losing young voters – especially young men – by double digits, and while polls on young people’s views on entitlement programs may not explain this loss, polls on immigration do. Biden’s border disaster has sparked a backlash from young Americans, with young men saying the border is more critical than a host of other major issues coming up in November.
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Manzanita Miller is an associate analyst at the Americans for Limited Government Foundation.
Photo “Illegal Immigrants” by Jan Modlin.
