The youngest voters in swing states are highly motivated to cast ballots this fall, according to a recent poll, and they could prove to be difference-makers in a number of key races.
The Gen Z Swing State Survey, conducted by Generation Labs for the left-leaning Voters of Tomorrow, found that 67 percent of people ages 18-24 in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin said they are “absolutely” or “likely” to vote in November’s midterm elections.
In the previous midterm election, 32 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds voted. In 2020, when more voters than ever cast ballots, 51 percent of that cohort participated.
“Young people are under attack from the far-right on so many different fronts — from abortion restrictions to book bans to gun violence –– and realize that this election could determine what rights we have going forward,” said Jack Lobel, deputy communications director for Voters of Tomorrow.
Each of the surveyed states features competitive House, Senate and gubernatorial races. Democrats in Generation Z are more likely to vote than Republicans (78 percent, compared to 63 percent).
This year, the members of Generation Z in those states say they are primarily concerned abortion rights, with 37 percent saying that issue will influence how they vote. Both jobs/economy and health care were identified by 35 percent (respondents could name three issues.)
Concerns about democracy fell near the bottom of the list: democracy reform/voting rights (11 percent), the Jan. 6, 2021 riot (6 percent), reforming/eliminating the Senate filibuster (5 percent).
“The far-right has given us so many reasons to show up this November. Our mission to protect access to abortion care is just one of them,” Lobel said.
A recent survey by The New York Times found that, among all registered votes nationwide, the economy is considered the most important problem facing the United States (26 percent), followed by inflation/cost of living at 18 percent and abortion running a distant third at 5 percent. Even among those 18-29, abortion remained in third (at 10 percent).
Earlier this year, the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement identified the House, Senate and governor’s races where youth voters can have the most impact.
The Senate races in each of the seven states included in the survey made CIRCLE’s list of 10, including the top five (Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin).
In terms of gubernatorial races, four of the states made CIRCLE’s 10, including Wisconsin (no. 2) and Arizona (no. 2).
“Young people in Wisconsin, which is in the top-5 of both of our rankings, make up 16% of the state’s population, have a 68% voter registration rate, and have demographic characteristics correlated with high voter turnout,” wrote the researchers for CIRCLE, which is part of Tufts University’s Tisch College.
Lobel identified a handful of candidates who have done a particularly good job of reaching out to young voters, including Democrats Josh Shapiro and John Fetterman, who are running for governor and senator, respectively, in Pennsylvania.
“Young people make up 16% of the state’s population, 69% of youth are registered to vote, and young people had above-average voter turnout in the past two federal elections,” CIRCLE wrote.
Voters of Tomorrow has a particular affinity for a particular Democrat seeking a House seat in Florida.
“It also goes without saying that Maxwell Frost, who will soon become the first Gen Z member of Congress and whom we were proud to endorse early on in his candidacy, is one candidate who appeals to us, not just because he is one of us, but because he will fight for our future,” Lobel said.
image of U.S. President Donald Trump is displayed on a digital billboard in Times Square in New York on April 8, 2026.
Trump is stuck between two realities. Neither serves the American people
Normally, I worry that events may overtake a column. But not so with the Iran war.
I don’t worry about running afoul of a headline or Truth Social post from the president because what is said about the situation is no longer very relevant to the reality.
On April 8, Nick Catoggio, my Dispatch colleague, dubbed an earlier stoppage with Iran “Schrödinger’s ceasefire.” This was a reference to the famous thought experiment by the physicist Erwin Schrödinger, who was trying to explain the weirdness of “superpositionality” in quantum physics. A cat in a box is both dead and alive at the same time until you open the box. Schrödinger meant to illustrate the absurdity of the idea that particles aren’t any one thing, but a “cloud of probabilities.”
The Trump administration is stuck in a word cloud of probabilities of his own making. The war is over. The war is on. The war isn’t a war. We have a deal, but we don’t have a deal, but we’re about to have a deal. We destroyed Iran’s military. No, we left it intact. We want regime change. No we don’t. We already accomplished it. We “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program a year ago. We had to go to war in February to prevent nuclear war. The Strait of Hormuz is open, closed, or something in-between. No deal without “unconditional surrender.” Let’s make a deal!
This everything-all-at-once vibe can be disorienting, particularly since most Americans didn’t have a war with Iran on their bingo cards until the shooting had already started. President Trump didn’t prepare the country or consult with Congress beforehand because he thought it would all be a smashing success in a matter of weeks.
The miscalculation that started it all: killing Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and much of Iran’s senior leadership, on the first day of the war. To “the great proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand,” Trump announced on Feb. 28. “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.”
I support regime change in Iran and shed no tears for Khamenei or his goons. But when you start a war by killing the regime’s top leaders, it’s not unreasonable for the remaining ones to conclude that you really intend regime change.
Khamenei was a murderous fanatic, but he was a fairly cautious one. He liked to threaten closing the Strait of Hormuz or attacking our regional allies, but he was reluctant to actually do it, fearing it would invite a regime change war. The mullahs and IRGC goons believed, not unreasonably, that if they lost their grip on power, they’d be lynched by the Iranian people they’ve brutalized for decades.
By starting with a regime change war, Trump removed any reason for the regime not to go for broke. When you have nothing to lose — particularly when you are a millenarian religious fanatic — a Persian Alamo strategy makes a lot of sense.
So Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz and attacked its neighbors.
But it turns out this wasn’t the Alamo. In the contest of wills, Trump blinked. The Iranian regime’s tolerance for punishment proved — so far — to be greater than Trump’s and that of our gulf allies. Militarily we could finish the job, but that would require ground troops and much greater economic turmoil. In a conflict Trump launched unilaterally without the prior support of Congress, NATO or the American people, Trump doesn’t have the political capital for that.
But that’s only half the problem. Trump wants the war over, but he doesn’t want to pay — militarily, economically, politically — what that would cost. So he wants to make a deal that ends it. But there is no deal available that wouldn’t come at an equally undesirable cost. Any deal that looks like what President Obama struck with the Iranians would be too embarrassing to bear. But the Iranians are convinced that they can get just such a deal, and they’re willing to drag things out as long as it takes.
The result: Trump’s in a box of his own making. He thinks he can talk his way out by simply asserting a reality that doesn’t exist. When the financial markets get nervous, he announces a breakthrough that is, at best, a possibility. When the Iranians agree to a deal that looks similar to one Obama might negotiate, Trump goes back to his threats.
It can’t go on forever. But I’m sure it’ll last until long after this column is forgotten.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.