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What do President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani have in common? Not much, except this: young adults love them.
In fact, both men owe their electoral victories in part to Gen Z, my generation. Seventy-eight percent of voters ages 18 to 29 turned out for Mamdani on Nov. 4, according to one breakdown, including 67% of young men and 84% of young women.
Just a year earlier, many in this same demographic were heading to the polls to cast their votes for Trump. The president won 46% of Gen Zers last year, including 56% of young men and 40% of young women, significantly improving his standing among this group compared to 2020 and 2016.
If this wild swing from right to left has given you whiplash, I don’t blame you. But there is some method to the madness.
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What drew young adults to Mamdani is the same thing that drew them to Trump: his promise to be different, to radically upend a system that Gen Zers believe has failed and disenfranchised them.
It is not a coincidence, for example, that Trump’s approval among young adults was highest in February and March of this year when he began aggressively rolling out his agenda. Of course, some of that can be attributed to the honeymoon effect that every president enjoys at the start of his term. But the policies themselves earned Gen Z’s favor.
Take the Department of Government Efficiency, for instance: nearly three in four college-age Americans said they supported Trump’s efforts to slash waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government. Older voters might have found DOGE’s cuts jarring, but for young adults it felt like the first time something was actually getting done.
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Mamdani’s proposals obviously are radically different from Trump’s. Instead of gutting government to make it more responsive, Mamdani wants to increase its size and scope in just about every respect. Indeed, during his victory speech on Tuesday, Mamdani insisted he’ll prove there’s no problem “too small” for his government to solve.
That’s a terrifying thought to those familiar with political reality and history. But to young adults my age who too often are unacquainted with either, Mamdani’s pledge sounds like a genuine attempt to make New York City’s government work for them rather than against them — with some free stuff thrown in along the way.
This point is key. Young adults feel as though they have no place in our government and economy, and they are desperate for a way in. Older Americans might dismiss Gen Z’s concerns as a rite of passage, but the fact is the American dream they watched their parents and grandparents achieve feels completely unattainable now.
Unlike older generations, for example, many young adults are saddled with crippling student loan debt from chasing degrees that no longer provide the cushy white-collar careers they were promised. And on Nov. 4, a new report found that the median age of a first-time homebuyer in the U.S. is now 40 years old — an all-time high.
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This is why Gen Zers were the most optimistic about Trump’s plan to bring down the cost of housing, but also why they’re wooed by Mamdani’s inane promise to freeze rent across the Big Apple. Anything — anything — is better than the current trajectory.
It also helps that both Mamdani and Trump made a deliberate effort to connect with young adults where they’re at: social media. Call it TikTok populism, but Gen Zers are simply much more likely to be persuaded by the candidate who understands how to communicate with them. Trump did this by barnstorming the independent podcast scene, and Mamdani did it with catchy reels and influencer endorsements.
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Ultimately, my generation is motivated less by policy specifics and more by a broad agenda that promises to dismantle the status quo. Maybe that makes Gen Z young and dumb, but you’ll be hard-pressed to find a young voter who cares. We’re not interested in preserving an establishment we have no stake in, nor are we willing to settle for the managed decline that keeps older generations comfortable but sacrifices our chance at a prosperous future.
If Republicans want to keep building on the inroads Trump made with Gen Z, they need to recognize this and make good on Trump’s promise to upend the way Washington works. What Gen Z wants is change — and fast.
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