The NPR Politics Podcast - Young Voters, Young Politicians

Episode Date: August 10, 2023

Turnout among voters under 30 has been high in recent elections, but there are still major impediments — both systemic issues and cultural ones — that keep younger people from casting ballots. And there are similar roadblocks when those folks want to run for office, especially when it comes to funding their campaigns.This episode: voting correspondent Miles Parks, political correspondent Ashley Lopez, and political reporter Elena Moore.The podcast is produced by Elena Moore and Casey Morell. Our editor is Eric McDaniel. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi. Unlock access to this and other bonus content by supporting The NPR Politics Podcast+. Sign up via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Connect:Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.Subscribe to the NPR Politics Newsletter.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hello, this is Jenna. I'm on the beautiful campus of Florida Atlantic University awaiting the procession for my graduation. This podcast was recorded at 1.04 p.m. on August 10th, 2023. Things may have changed by the time you hear it, but I will officially have my master's in computer engineering. All right, here's the show, and go Owls! Well, congratulations. Go Owls. Yeah, I get so excited when there's a Florida timestamp. I was just excited that there's a mascot that's an owl.

Yes, yes, Florida Atlantic. Congratulations. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics. And I'm Elena Moore.

I also cover politics. Earlier this week, we talked about old politicians, and now we are doing the other end of the spectrum, young voters and young lawmakers. We'll start with young voters. This population group has historically had the lowest voter registration and participation rates in elections of any age group in the United States. But lately, some states are doing something to try to change that. Ashley, you've been reporting on this for the last couple of weeks. And let's start with the problem. Why is it that young voters have just been voting in lower numbers than other of their age groups? Well, registration is the first

hurdle, obviously. And I mean, I guess we should just start from the very beginning, which is like the United States is one of the few democratic nations that requires people to register. And if you're young, you know, you don't interact with the government a lot. So this might be the first time that you have to fill out paperwork and go through a government process. And that could be either, you know, overwhelming or... Have you ever been 18? You have so many other things to worry about. I feel like you've got breakups going on. You're going off to college. Government forms are not what you are focused on. What are states doing to try to fix this? You know, states have been looking at either since 2020, finding ways to make voting more accessible. Because if we remember during the pandemic, some states started opening up vote by mail.

You know, they kind of saw, and they saw in the results that a lot of people started taking advantage of voting. And so they saw this like venue to sort of make voting easier in some ways. And then some other states reacted to the big lie and have decided to respond to mostly their Republican voters

who feel that there needs to be more restrictions in place. And so they have added more laws and sort of barriers to voting for some voters. But on the side of states that are looking at making voting easier, voter registration is something that they've been taking a stab at. And so automatic voter registration

is something that some states have been trying. The way it works is like, if you interact with the DMV, you sign up to drive for the first time to get your driver's license is like if you interact with the DMV, like you sign up to drive for the first time to get your driver's license, like that information that you give the DMV gets used to register to you to vote. And that's been very effective. And it's been particularly effective. There's been more and more states who have been looking at policies like that. Elena, I feel like this is kind of a two-pronged problem, though. I mean, like all the things that

Ashley's talking about, which are structural barriers that make it hard for young people to vote. But then there's the other aspect of this that I heard when I was, I reported a LifeKit a few years ago about how to vote, just trying to explain the process. And I remember hearing a lot from people, even older people, that they were pretty intimidated at the process. Like you might go into like, let's say that a presidential election, knowing who you want to vote for for president, and you look at your ballot, and you've got like elections for state house representatives and public works commission, and there's an amendment that you have no idea what it means. Is part of this for young people like an intimidation factor as well?

Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned that, because I have heard that when talking to voters. Earlier this year, for a different story, I talked with Jenna Ruiz, who was 19 when we spoke. She's a student at Miami Dade College, and she has, you know, experience in politics. She's involved in student government, and she was still uneasy about casting her ballot. I felt, I'm not going to lie, a little bit lost on some of the things that were on the ballot. I do identify more towards the Democratic Party, but I still felt like I didn't really know everything that was on this year, and I was really interested in this idea of just like, is there a little bit still of a civic uneasiness with young people? And there was some data out of the education advocacy organization Murmuration, the Walton Family Foundation and this polling firm Social Sphere. third of voters under 26 who voted in the midterms said that they wanted more political information about both candidates and their policies, even though they voted. Like a third of them were still unsure. And that's compared to just like one in 10 of older generations. Wow. Young voters are in a tough spot. They're in this like kind of negative loop, which is like they vote a lot

right now and historically haven't. So they're not a good investment for political parties. So when you have a small campaign budget or even a pretty big one, you're kind of judicious about where you spend that money. And if you know that, you know, messaging to young people is not going to yield you the same kind of bang for your buck as like, you know, other voting blocks that you know, like, you know, suburban voters, something like older suburban voters who you know, are definitely going to turn out to the polls, you're just not going to spend that money on that messaging. So it's like it creates this situation where like then young people continue to not go to the polls and not feel like part of the process. So it's kind of in a tough spot that sort of begins with,

you know, these sort of like early barriers. All right, let's leave it there for now. We'll take a quick break. We'll be right back. And we're back. And Elena, I want to move to a story you reported on this week, which is about David Hogg, who's this activist from Parkland, Florida, school shooting survivor who has been working over the last few years fighting for gun control legislation. But he started this new group to more broadly affect getting younger candidates into office. Tell me about what this group is. Yeah. So this week, David Hogg announced a new group that he's going to be the president of, and it's called Leaders We Deserve. It's a hybrid political action committee, and it's going to focus on financially backing and supporting young candidates running for federal and state office.

So basically, they're going to supply both the funds but also kind of some on-the-ground guidance to these younger candidates. For federal office, they're going to support people under 35. And for state office, they're going to support people under 30. So it's a pretty young group. That's younger millennials, Gen Z people. And the focus right now, you know, this idea came to be because for Hogg, he's seen in these state legislatures around the country, there are a lot of states that have Republican majorities. And, Hogg is somebody who's pretty liberal. And he's watched these places usher through policy that,

you know, goes against what a lot of Democrats stand for on restricting abortion rights, changing gun laws, curbing LGBTQ rights. And that bore this idea for him of like we need to stack the deck, so to speak, with more young people to kind of lead the charge as people keep aging into politics. Well, it's really interesting because, Ashley, I mean, we talked a second ago about the kind of structural barriers for young people to vote. But there are structural barriers for young people to run for office, too, right? Yeah, I mean, finances are a big one, right? Like, if you think of, like, when most people become the most politically active, it's when they buy a house. And when you start to consider even running for office, a lot of that is like, are you financially stable enough to do that? Do you have people with money around you who could help support your campaign? Like, I mean,

money is a big factor in that. And if you think of like, you know, I'm a millennial and believe me, I can tell you the sort of financial reality that a lot of us have lived in is very different from like our boomer parents who had just a lot more money at this age, especially like in their 30s. And so, you know, that is I think has been a big barrier for people who are even considering running for office. I mean, obviously it think it was just in the last two years, have a member of Congress. I'm represented by someone who is a lot of his this last five years working with March for Our Lives, this group that he helped co-found out of the Parkland school shooting. And one of the organizers he worked with was now Florida Congressman Maxwell Frost. He is the first Gen Z member of Congress. He's 26 years old. So one of Hogg's, you know, close colleagues and friends is now in Congress, born out of these youth-led movements, these grassroots movements that don't have a lot of money when they start. movements be born out of in response to conservative action, whether it was the Women's

March, whether it was the movement for Black Lives, whether it was the environment or gun violence. So I think that that money conversation is essential here because David Hogg, who was a grassroots organizer, is like, I need to go on the inside. I need to fund more people who are in these movements and actually give them the funds to run because that's not there. And we know, I mean, this is a tale as old as time in terms of turning activist energy into political will. Starting a group like this doesn't magically solve that problem. But I'm curious on if Hogg talked to you, Elena, a little bit about what his strategy

is going to be for actually affecting change. Yeah, I had a similar thought because he was talking to me all about how he's motivated to get young people, especially in these state legislatures, to combat, you know, waves of more conservative legislation. But he also told me they're focusing on safe Democratic seats. And so I was like, those things, how can you flip a legislature when you're focusing on seats that are already held by Democrats? Those things don't really add up. And so, yeah, he agreed. And really, the focus here is about planting the seeds for a future majority instead of flipping things now.

You know, in some races, it may not be best for somebody who's 21 years old to be running in that seat that's more competitive. But what our plan here is to do is to help elect those young people in those open blue seat primaries, where for a very small investment, we can make a major amount of change in terms of the branding of that state Democratic Party, for example, to show a new face, a new generation. And with that, I think it can have an up and down ballot effect. And that gets back to the Maxwell Frost conversation. It's like, yes, he won around Orlando. That's a blue area. But now there's a Gen Z-er in Congress, and that has a bigger effect, in addition to being someone that people can look at in Florida. And Hogg also told me that the group plans, you know,

in the general election to weigh in and support candidates in more competitive seats. But right now, priority in the primary, blue seats. All right, well, let's leave it there for today. I'm Myles Parks. I for today. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics. And I'm Elena Moore. I also cover politics.

And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.