Biden and the young people

Voters under 40 are frustrated with a president who doesn't share their worldview

This morning I woke to a lot of journalists offering advice to Biden. One says he should take a lesson from Harry Truman. Another says he should deploy an army of surrogates, sharpen his attacks on Trump, and put the White House on a “war footing.” I think we’re in better shape the polls would have us believe, but I would rather run scared than be overconfident. I do think Democrats need to shore up their base and I think the work begins now, not next spring or summer.

Joe Biden has a problem with young people. Or, maybe more accurately, young people have a problem with Joe Biden. I’ve had four conversations in the last few days that have convinced me that it’s a problem Democrats need to address. Those discussions reflect a Quinnipiac poll from a couple of weeks ago that showed RKF, Jr. leading both Trump and Biden among voters under 35 years old. For Democrats to win next year, they will need to fix the problem.

I think Israel’s response to the terror attack was the last straw for a lot of young people who already had doubts about Biden. In three conversations with parents of children in their 20s and 30s, my friends said their kids and their kid’s friends are angry at Biden and demanding an alternative. My daughter, who is 34, said a number of her friends say they won’t vote for Biden if he’s the nominee.

My instinct was to defend Biden in all of these conversations. When I quit arguing, I began to hear their concerns a bit more. Some of the problem is a generational divide and view of the world based on lived experiences. Some of it is self-interest with doubts about their future. All of it is real angst that Democrats need to address before next year.

With a tone bordering on panic, two of the parents told me Democrats need to find a candidate besides Biden. Their children’s generation would not support him. They believe he is too old and they consider him a “war monger.” They are appalled at the deaths of children in Gaza and they are not bought into the war in Ukraine. I think that’s where the generational divide is greatest.

If, like me, you’re over 50 years old, you grew up during the Cold War. An expansionist and repressive Russia was the enemy of a West dominated by liberal democracies. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the breakup of the Soviet Union highlighted the end of brutal totalitarian regimes that kept their countries behind an Iron Curtain.

For us, watching Putin’s rise is like watching history repeat itself. He wants to dominate the states surrounding Russia with a thuggish and corrupt regime. Ukraine is the line in the sand that will keep Putin from moving into smaller states like Moldova, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. We don’t want to go back to a time of perpetual fear of Russian aggression and we don’t want to sacrifice those countries who have been free from Russian domination for only 40 years. We see Russia as an existential threat to the concept of liberal democracy and a destabilizing influence on all of Europe.

We also grew up with constant reminders of World War II and the Nazi genocide against the Jews. Images of the concentration camps and crematoriums were part of the news reels of our lives. We heard first-hand accounts of survivors. The Diary of Anne Frank was required for a lot of us. We knew the horrors Jews faced and we knew that 6 million of them had died in Hitler’s attempt to wipe them all out. The formation and recognition of the state of Israel was a matter of recovery and survival for a people with nowhere else to go.

We have supported Israel as a liberal democracy surrounded by autocratic states, some quite hostile. For us, they proved they live by the rule of law when they tried Adolf Eichmann in a court of law. They trade Palestinian prisoners for captured Israeli soldiers. They allow protests of their government, respecting freedom of speech and freedom to assemble, at least among Isreali citizens.

My generation’s perception of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict was shaped by a book and series of events that shocked and thrilled the western world. Leon Uris wrote Exodus about the founding of Israel and, rightly or wrongly, gave Americans their understanding of the conflict in the region. At the Munich Olympics, Palestinian terrorists took Israeli coaches and athletes hostage and ended up killing eleven of them as the drama unfolded in realtime on television. It was horrifying. A few years later, after a series of hijackings by Palestinian extremists, Israeli commandos spectacularly liberated a hijacked plane that had been diverted to Entebbe, Uganda, where the hijackers were welcomed by the country’s brutal dictator, Idi Amin. It was a blow to both terrorism and a totalitarian state. The western world applauded and celebrated the rescue.

Our children did not grow up with the Berlin Airlift, Prague Spring, the Cuban Missile Crisis, or proxy wars like Vietnam as the backdrop to their lives. As far as they are concerned, there’s only one Germany. For most of their lives, Russia was not on their radar screen and they had probably never heard of Ukraine until a few of years ago.

They probably didn’t read Anne Frank or see Schindler’s List. They almost certainly never read Exodus. They probably never heard of Ellie Weisel or Simon Wiesenthal. According a poll in 2020, 63% of Americans under 40-years-old did not know that 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust. If they had any understanding of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict before October 7, it was probably shaped partly by events like the killings of American peace activist Rachel Corrie and Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, the bulldozing of Palestinian homes by West Bank settlers, and footage of Israeli soldiers standing off against rock-throwing Palestinian teenagers. They do not see Israel as a particularly sympathetic state.

In addition to foreign events, younger Americans are facing higher housing costs and interest rates than their parents. They are congregating in urban areas where they can’t afford to buy a first home, often the first step to accumulating personal wealth and access to capital. And while their incomes may be starting to rise again, they’ve essentially been flat since the pandemic.

All of these factors have created dissatisfaction and restlessness among younger Americans. Like most voters, they hold the president responsible for their ill-feelings. In the current case, they also believe Biden is too old. They see a geezer in the White House who does not share their world view and is out of touch with their personal struggles.

That said, none of the parents with whom I spoke thought their kids would vote for Trump. Those younger voters may be dismayed by our political leaders, but they aren’t taken in by the conman spouting gibberish at his rallies. Their parents fear they will sit out the next election.

Voters under 40 have been a crucial part of the Democratic base since the Obama years. When they vote, Democrats do well. When they stay home Democrats suffer. The party needs to make them understand the stakes of the election.

I don’t believe anybody is going to change the world view of these voters under forty between now and next year, but Democrats need to make the case that the Biden administration is a much better choice for their future than a second Trump administration. While they should give examples of how Biden has helped, like offering student debt relief while Republicans block it, they need to raise the stakes in the election.

Trump and his minions are threatening our democracy. At his rallies, he’s calling for locking up immigrants and shutting down free speech. Already, Republicans are banning books in schools and libraries across the country. The case is not hard to make.

Young people are key to Joe Biden’s success next year. The Trumpists are going to show up in droves like they did in 2020 and 2016. Democrats need voters under 40 to turnout in high numbers to offset them. They’re not likely to come out because they are excited about Biden, but they will if they fear Trump.

I don’t have all of the answers, but I know reaching out to young people is key. Educating them about the stakes of the election is a better strategy than trying to change their mind about Biden. They may think he’s old and misguided about foreign policy, but I don’t think they believe he is a threat to democracy. Trump is. They might be frustrated with Biden, but they should fear Trump. Fear is a motivator while frustration leads to apathy.