If demographics are destiny, then the GOP is screwed.
“Millions of words and hours of news programming have been devoted to the issue of the Democratic Party’s recent loss of male voters aged 18 to 29.
“Less discussed, however, is the fact that the Republican Party faces a more severe version of the Democrats’ current demographic crisis: the GOP has lost nearly all female voters under 30. Even less discussed is the fact that, while Democrats rack their brains trying to find ways to win over young men, the right doesn’t seem to recognize the seriousness of its own predicament, much less have a plan to fix it.
“I suppose when you’re already used to surrendering entire voting blocs, as the Republican Party practically has in past elections with black and, to a lesser extent, Jewish voters, losing one more probably feels more a matter of routine than a sign of impending doom.
“Yet, considering that there are eight million more registered female voters than male voters in the United States, and considering that of the overall number of female voters, the 10 percent to 12 percent that fall into the 18-to-29 age bracket are much more politically active than men their age, Republicans simply cannot accept that they’ve lost another voting group. Democrats, in some cases, can afford to lose young men and make up the difference with their more politically engaged female counterparts. The GOP has no such cushion.
“The Republican Party’s struggle to attract young female voters was evident once again following the recent elections in New York, Virginia, and New Jersey. In the Big Apple, Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani won 84 percent of the vote among women aged 18 to 29. In New Jersey, Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill won 81 percent of the same age group. In Virginia, Attorney General-elect Jay Jones won 76 percent of these voters, while Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger won 81 percent.
These are huge numbers, obviously, and further evidence of an electoral trend that overwhelmingly favors Democrats.
In the 2024 presidential election, women under 30 favored the Democratic nominee over the Republican by a 17-point margin. In the 2022 midterm elections, women in this age group preferred Democrats over Republicans by a 46-point margin. In the 2020 presidential election, the margin was 32 points. Earlier, in the 2018 midterm elections, the margin was around 33 points.
However, instead of reacting to these sex-specific drubbings with urgency or even panic, conservative commentary and GOP circles tend to respond with mockery, disdain, and/or indifference.
“You’ve probably seen it before: pundits joking/not joking that the 19th Amendment was a “mistake”; legislators dismissing the entire bloc as sad, childless spinsters; certain commentators claiming, based on electoral results, that there is no greater enemy of Western civilization than the young woman; and TV and podcast hosts ridiculing female voters under 30 for being generally stupid and dangerous. In fact, if you tuned into Fox News the day after the elections in Virginia, New York, and elsewhere, you might have seen host Jesse Watters describing Mamdani’s supporters as single, childless, and lonely.
…. “(Interestingly enough, this attitude — “My candidate isn’t the problem; the voters are!” — is seen most often in Democratic circles whenever a minority bloc flips for a Republican. When this happens, there’s usually a round of accusations that the voters are “race traitors,” that they’re voting against their “own interests,” and so on.)
“This isn’t meant to single out Watters, or to give New Yorkers — young and old — a pass for electing Mamdani, but rather to highlight a broader lack of concern on the right regarding its loss of young female voters.
“The Democratic Party’s attempts to reconnect with young men have thus far been deeply stupid and embarrassing. These efforts have included ads about beer, ads warning that Republicans will kidnap your girlfriend, and dropping the hapless gorm Tim Walz into a field of tall grass with a shotgun to affect a pose of manliness. The Minnesota governor’s ill-conceived outing accomplished the exact opposite. Still, any attempt to win back disaffected voters, no matter how silly, is better than acting as if the problem doesn’t exist. Say what you will about the clown car that is the modern-day Democratic Party, but at least it is trying to win over young men.
“The same can’t be said for the Republican Party, which will continue to suffer electoral defeat at the hands of young women until it takes its demographic losses at least half as seriously as Democrats take theirs.”
I notice that the author doesn’t offer any solution either. Is there one? I can’t see one, but I do know that Republicans like Senator Lindsey Graham aren’t helping. In the wake of Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v Wade and its ensuing fury, Graham introduced a bill two months before the 2022 elections that would have imposed a nationwide ban on abortion. The bill had absolutely no — zero— chance of passage, yet, challenged on why he’d introduced it, replied, If not now, when?”. Well, considering he’d been trying to get that same ban passed since 2013, without success, I’d have suggested that the right time to try again was not that summer. The resulting red wave that saw an unprecedented number of furious female voters (of all ages) proved me right.
UPDATE: Self-deportation. The problem could solve itself.
