NYC NOW - September 10, 2024: Evening Roundup

Episode Date: September 10, 2024

Local government in Princetown, New Jersey is looking to take over the land once home to a world renowned choral educational institution, the Westminster Choir College. Plus, WNYC’s Sean Carlson talks with Michael Bellia, president of the Fordham University College Republicans, and New York City Councilman Chi Osse about the issues important to Gen Z voters ahead of Tuesday’s presidential debate.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. I'm Jinnay P.A. We begin in Princeton, New Jersey, where the local government is looking to take over the land once home to a world-renowned choral educational institution. For 60 years, the Westminster Choir College featured world-class performance spaces and practice facilities. But on Monday night, the town council introduced two measures to start the purchase of the 30-acre property. The school stopped operating in Princeton and moved to Lawrenceville in 2020 due to financial hardships. Now the town wants to buy the land to develop it. The mayor and town council say the acquisition would allow them to make a generational investment in education and other public needs.

Coming up, two young leaders in New York City discuss what they're looking for in their next U.S. president. After the break, more on the issues Gen Z cares about. Stay close. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump will take the stage in Philadelphia Tuesday night for what may be their only debate before November's election. The candidates will want to make a big impression on undecided voters and the nearly 41 million members of Gen Z who are eligible to vote this year. It's a large voting block that both Democrats and Republicans have been making an extra effort to win. We wanted to learn more about how that's playing out, so we brought together two young leaders. in our area. Michael Belaya is president of the Fordham University College Republicans. And New York

City Council member Chi Ose is a Democrat who represents Crown Heights and Bedstay. He was elected as the youngest member of the council and is its only Gen Z member. My colleague Sean Carlson talked with the two of them about the issues Gen Z cares about. Councilmember O'Say, what do you think has really worked for reaching Gen Z Democrats ahead of the election? So I think it's in twofold, right? I think seeing how the Harris campaign has really been taking a hold of social media has been done through the lens of Gen Z. If you see Harris HQ and how they've been outreaching through Twitter or X and TikTok and Instagram, it's been done in a way that is actually proven to be relatable to young voters. And while that's only, you know, one segment of outreach, I really think that a bulk

of Gen Z support for Democrats comes through democratic values, right? Young people, care about protecting abortion. Young people care about protecting the climate. And I believe that the Democratic Party is the party that presents solutions to those issues that these young people care about. Can you talk about what you've done as a council member that's been effective at reaching your Gen Z constituents? And have you noticed anything that works or doesn't work? So, you know, I believe that the best way to campaign not only as a candidate, but on issues, is to reach voters wherever they're at, not only through mailers and door knocking, and phone banking, but again, through social media.

You know, my first race in 2021, my district saw the largest turnout of young people to vote in local city council race, and that's because not only am I or was I a young candidate, but I knew how to utilize the tech that was at hand, right? Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, even though that's used by an older audience now, but it engaged a lot of people who have never been engaged in a local election before. Social media is a great tool to organize, to turn people, a lot, and that's been a proven tactic that we've used within this office, whether it's been to have

people to show up to testify at a rent guidelines board hearing or to show up to talk about how they are in support of my broker fee legislation. Michael, what have you noticed the Republican Party doing that's really speaking to you and your fellow Gen Z voters? I agree with the councilman here that the Democrats have been doing a better job messaging to younger voters. And perhaps the best example of that is just the campaign websites that you see of Republicans and Democrats, right? You go to a Republican-ran campaign website. And what do you see? Well, they don't make it difficult to donate, but when you go to the donation page and you scroll down, you see you have to enter card information. There's a bunch of other information you have to fill out. You're probably getting a bunch of pop-ups

when you're doing it. It's frustrating. On the other hand, if you go to a Democrat-ran campaign website, they make it really easy to donate. You scroll down to the bottom. The donation tab is there. You can use Apple Pay, Google Pay. You don't have to take your credit card out of your wallet. That's a major improvement that Democrats have made just to their user interface on their websites. that makes it easier for them to engage with younger voters. Another big one is voter registration. Democrats have done a far better job at engaging younger people and getting them registered to vote.

Republicans, perhaps it's because there's this assumption there that people believe it's their civic obligation to go out and vote and they don't feel the need to try to energize people and get them involved. But Republicans do have an opportunity here to connect directly with younger voters, for example, where our parents might have bought a home 15, 20 years ago for three to four times their average income today, Gen Z is going to be spending seven to ten times their average income to buy those same homes. That's a serious problem. It's very easy for a politician to go to an older voting block and talk about Social Security and protecting Social Security, which is important.

But that same politician should go before a younger voter block and explain to them how they're going to keep Social Security solvent for the next 45 years. How do you think the Republican Party can reach even more new young voters? I think one of the best ways they could do this, and I think they've been pretty effective at this so far as you see a willingness also to sit down with people who represent something that's not exactly traditional media. One of those segments of people are these podcasters that have grown a lot on YouTube, watching people like President Trump sit down with a Theo Vaughn or a Lex Freeman the other day. It's definitely interesting to see because this obviously was something that didn't exist in politics

just a few years ago. And his willingness to do this and Republicans' willingness to do this are exposing them to a lot more people. People are listening to one, two, three hour long form videos watching the entire thing in full. But then on top of that, there's also this trend of short-form videos on YouTube shorts or Instagram reels. And one of the effective things about these longer-form conversations is you could take clips from them, you could cut them down.

And these clips often tend to go viral. They reach a lot of people. You could see some of the highlights and segments of those podcasts. And people are engaged with that. Those videos are getting a lot of views. It's exposing a lot of new ideas to younger people. One of the benefits of this is that often the podcasts themselves are of that,

younger demographic. They're asking questions that people my age want to hear. And getting answers to those where you wouldn't otherwise get answers to those questions has been really effective in reaching people. Michael, according to a recent New York Times and Sienna College poll, there's a significant gender gap between young male and women voters. Do you notice that at your university? Yeah, absolutely. And we hosted a club fair just about a week ago now to sign people up for our club. And we're right next to the college Democrats table. We get along very well as leadership of the two clubs. But you definitely see it with the people signing up. There's an overwhelming number of males signing up for the Republican club, overwhelming number of females signing up

for the Democrat club. I feel probably one of the biggest reasons behind that is this idea of bodily rights. I think Republicans have to come out with a clearer stance there. And I think the moves that they have made to support reproductive freedoms to support access to contraceptives, for example, are ways to at least alleviate some of the anxiety that people may have about the positions the Republican Party would take on those issues. So Councilmember O'Say, I'm going to flip that coin here. You just heard Michael talk about what Republicans can do to maybe reach more young women voters. How do you think Democrats could better appeal to young male voters who are on the fence?

You know, I do believe that a lot of policies that Donald Trump and the Republican Party are putting forward, especially around the economy, you know, putting money in pockets is certainly appealing to a lot of young male voters who are looking towards their future and then looking towards a party that that will represent that. I think that, you know, even as someone who attended the DNC, who's been listening to, you know, many of the campaign speeches that have been coming out from the Harris campaign, they certainly want to hear more from the campaign speaking about how Democratic Party is going to take a rigorous stance on improving the economy. You know, I think that that is a hot button issue for voters of all ages. But I certainly believe that if this

campaign, you know, dived into their economic policy a bit more and more at the front at many of these speeches that are taking place, we would see an increase in young male voters within the Democratic Party. Michael, what's something about the time that Gen Z came of age that you think binds Gen Z voters from across parties? I think people are tired of the vitriol. They're tired of the division. You look towards older generations that are really enthusiastic about politics.

They get out and vote. but also now they can't converse with one another. They don't associate with one another. You have neighbors that don't speak to one another. And I think that just sort of makes Gen Z tired of dealing with politics. And the fact that people can't just hash out conversations in a friendly way about important issues, I think is definitely a critique of the way that our country has shifted. Gen Z has grown up in that environment.

Part of the reason is social media and the connectivity we have with one another. You know, it's very easy to sort of have these Twitter comments section debates about things never see each other face to face. I've long held the belief that I think both Democrats and Republicans generally want the same outcomes. We want prosperity. We want stability. We want peace abroad. We have the same goals.

We have different ways of getting there. And we shouldn't hate each other just because our means are different to achieve very similar ends. Instead, we should recognize that the ends are very similar and that there's a lot of compromises to be had to get us there. And I think if we do, you'll probably see more Gen Ziers engaged. I think will be something that Gen Zee's. you would very much appreciate. That's Michael Belaya, president of the Fordham University College Republicans

and New York City Councilman Chi Ose in conversation with my colleague, Sean Carlson. Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day. I'm Jene Pierre. We'll be back tomorrow.