Data showing Gen Z men trending toward the GOP is sparking debate among Democrats over how to win back a key bloc of voters that could prove critical for the party ahead of 2026.
A report from Decision Desk HQ released this week suggested that “Gen Z appears to be charting a different political course than Millennials” and noted that multiple indicators “point to substantial Republican gains among Gen Z.” In particular, the report noted that Democratic registration among young men had shrunk compared to young women.
While some experts note that registration trends don’t take into account changing attitudes among demographics between elections, the report is nonetheless providing further warning signs for Democrats as Gen Z men increasingly age into the voting electorate.
“Right now, I’m very concerned that we’re not doing enough because we’re failing to listen to what voters want,” Democratic activist and former Democratic National Committee vice-chair David Hogg told The Hill, citing House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries’s (D-N.Y.) withholding of an endorsement from New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani as an example.
The DDHQ analysis indicated that Democrats had lost ground among young voters in voter registration, particularly young men, during the 2024 cycle.
The same report showed that, while Democratic registration among young white women remained consistent with historical norms at 47 percent, Democratic registration among young white men, historically around 49 percent, had fallen to 29 percent.
The report also found modest losses among young non-white women; DDHQ noted that while roughly a decade ago, Democratic registration peaked at over 80 percent, it now sat at 75 percent. About 66 percent of young non-white men had usually registered Democratic, but the report noted Democratic voter registration now sat at 54 percent.
The gender gap in politics is not a new phenomenon, DDHQ chief elections analyst Geoffrey Skelley explained. But “the fact that we’re seeing a larger one right now, at least compared to their older brethren — I mean, I think that there could be something to be said for dissatisfaction among young men,” that’s currently on a pretty high level.
The report encompasses 31 states that report party affiliation in voter registration and focuses only on Republican and Democratic registration. The registration data is as recent as Jan. 1, 2025.
It also stresses that volatility of America politics, noting “political coalitions in the United States have historically proven remarkably fluid, with seemingly permanent advantages dissolving within a single election cycle.”
Democratic pollster and strategist Celinda Lake noted that registration done around the 2024 election was happening when Gen Z trended more Republican, but she noted that attitudes have been shifting back toward Democrats since then. Lake characterized Gen Z voters as being particularly volatile.
“They’re dissatisfied. They’re anxious. They’re not attached really to either party,” Lake explained.
Yet Democrats in particular are concerned about young men, something that has been reflected in recent polling.
“Democrats have regained ground with younger women, particularly younger women of color, Black women, Latino women, Asian women in particular,” and left-leaning independents, said Democratic pollster Ben Tulchin, who’s worked on Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-Vt.) presidential campaigns.
“But we haven’t bounced back yet with men,” he added.
Polling released in June by Tulchin’s firm and NextGen America, which surveyed 1,300 voters between the ages of 18 and 29 years old across the country, found young women voting Democrat on a generic ballot 66 percent to 24 percent, Tulchin said. Meanwhile, the polling found Republicans edged out Democrats among young men at 48 percent to 42 percent.
At the same time, Democrats say there are several opportunities for the party to reverse some of those losses with young men.
In a recent op-ed published in The New York Times, John Della Volpe, the director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics, who was also an adviser on former President Biden’s 2020 campaign, noted young men’s approval of Trump on the issues of inflation, jobs and the economy have all dropped substantially.
But Della Volpe warned that Democrats had to earn back the support of young men, noting that the polling against Trump on those issues didn’t necessarily mean Democrats would be the beneficiaries of it.
“Democrats have an opportunity to basically call the question which is Trump promised financial stability quickly for this generation, so you could be better providers cause that’s what you want to be. The question is, eight months into this, has he followed through on those promises?” Della Volpe said.
“They need to invest the time and the resources to communicate that far more effectively than they have been in recent years,” he added.
Tulchin, too, believed Democrats making the case against Republicans using the cost of living and the economy was messaging that did well among young men.
“The most effective message hits Trump and Republicans on making it harder for young people to succeed, that the costly tariffs and reckless policies that are killing good jobs and driving up prices on basic goods like food, cars and computers, and making it harder for people to pay their student loans, buy their first home, start a new business or start a family,” said Tulchin. “So, that message we found did really, really well in the polling.”
Gen Z men also said they want to see their leaders aligning with Democratic figures whom they believe meet the moment for young voters. One example that’s been echoed by a few has been Mamdani, the progressive New York City mayoral candidate who pulled off an upset against former Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) in the primary.
Though some establishment Democrats, including New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D), have come around to backing the New York assemblymember for mayor, other top leaders including Jeffries, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and New York State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs have so far not endorsed him.
“We cannot genuinely say vote blue no matter who and listen to people who say that when it’s somebody on the right side of the tent, and we’re not supporting the left side of the tent, because that’s how a tent collapses,” Hogg said.
Sunjay Muralitharan, national president of College Democrats of America, said Democrats could also take a page out of the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s playbook and organize more on college campuses with their own high-profile headliners.
“If you have someone like that who’s always going there and making the case, and we don’t have an alternative to kind of uplift, it’s very difficult for us to compete in the ground game,” he said.
