CNN analyst Harry Enten said Wednesday that younger Democrats are less willing to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris than the Democratic Party as a whole.
The findings contradict Harris’ campaign claims that her unique ability to galvanize the youth vote gives her a path to victory, according to a memo released Wednesday.
The data does not appear to support the campaign’s claims.
A CBS News/YouGov poll found that only 42% of young Democrats ages 18 to 29 feel more motivated to vote after President Joe Biden leaves office, compared with 39% of Democrats of all ages – a difference of just 3 percentage points.
“Even though the memes are spreading on the internet, they’re not showing up in the numbers,” Enten told CNN.
I looked to see if Harris has any unique appeal to young voters, Brat Summer or not. She doesn’t. She’s doing worse against Trump than she did against Biden in 2020.
Moreover, Biden’s departure has not made young Democrats disproportionately more motivated to vote than other Democrats. pic.twitter.com/WpH5Sf4vPE
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) July 24, 2024
Former President Donald Trump’s unique candidacy may be one reason Harris has a hard time winning over young voters, who are split 49 percent between Republicans and Democrats in 2024. In 2020, 56 percent of young voters were Democrats and 39 percent were Republicans, according to the Pew Research Center.
“When I say Harris is worse than Biden, I’m not saying she’s the only one who’s worse,” Enten said. “On the contrary, she’s struggling. She’s trying to combat a wave of opposition to Democrats among younger voters.”
Biden won the vote among people under 35 by 21 points in 2020. In contrast, Harris is trailing Biden in a CNN poll released on Sunday, with her lead at just nine points, 12 points worse than Biden’s performance.
Enten continued.
One might argue that things are better now than they were before Biden left office. [of the race]But compared to Democratic norms, which have won more than 20 percent of the young vote in presidential elections, at least this century, her share was much lower.
“If this is idiosyncratic support among young voters, I’d like to know what the non-idiosyncratic support is,” he said.
Wendell Fsebo is a political reporter for Breitbart News and a former war room analyst for the Republican National Committee. He is the author of: The Politics of Slave MoralityFollow Wendell “Bat” @WendellHusebø or The truth of society @WendellHusebo.
