Shaped by the duplicity and the draconian demands of the nation’s COVID response during their high school years, and the proliferation of podcasts addressing family values, fiscal responsibility, and individual liberty, a new Yale Youth Study of 4,100 self-described registered voters reveals that younger voters, ages 18-21, are significantly more likely to move toward traditional values.
This most recent poll — which oversampled those under age 30 — is just the latest to demonstrate that the newest voters are increasingly gravitating toward perspectives and behaviors that prioritize conservative ideals. These youngest voters are engaging with podcasts that resonate with those seeking clarity about social issues, including the economy, the family, crime, and the government corruption they witnessed during their most formative high school years.
For young males — especially young white males — dealing with a hostile society that has appeared to shun them, conservative podcasts provide one of the only venues that help them to understand and deal constructively with the hostility many of them have experienced from progressive teachers and counselors during their high school years. And for young females — especially female high school athletes — they are looking to social media and podcasts for ways to deal with the encroachment of biological males in their competitive sports and their restrooms and locker rooms. (RELATED: Trump’s Ban on Males in Female Sports: What It Does, Why It’s Justified, and the Left’s Outrage.)
All of this has had a dramatic effect on the values and behaviors of this newest cohort of voters. In fact, the Yale authors point out that the data revealed an important divide within the under age 30 as a cohort: “When asked whether they would vote for the Democratic or Republican candidate in the 2026 congressional elections in their district, voters aged 22–29 favored the Democratic candidate by a margin of 6.4 points, but voters aged 18–21 favored the Republican by a margin of 11.7 points.”
This is a significant change, and it reflects the courage of the youngest voters to embrace reality and reject the progressive policies advanced by an increasingly left-wing Democratic Party. Failing to recognize this dramatic societal transformation, David Hogg, the clueless Gen Z Democratic National Committee Vice Chair, recently told an interviewer that young people just want to “get laid and have fun.” (RELATED: ‘Get Laid’ and ‘Have Fun’: The Democrats (Still) Don’t Get It)
The Youngest Voters Discover Religion
The truth is that these youngest voters aged 18-21 are rejecting the kind of life that Hogg is promoting, preferring instead to find meaning in authentic relationships and traditional institutions. Many of them are turning to religion — and religious podcasts — for answers. For example, a popular podcast, the “Bible in a Year,” offers a way for young people to understand how the stories in the Bible have resonance for their lives today. Hosted by Fr. Mike Schmitz, this podcast is consistently ranked as the #1 global podcast in Religion and Spirituality on Apple Podcasts since 2021 and has been downloaded over 700 million times.
For young men, there is a growing number of Christian podcasts. For example, “Godly Young Men (GYM)” is for young men ages 15-25 who are “desiring to be stronger men of God.” Dealing with the spiritual side of being a godly young man, as well as the practical side, topics include the “importance of working out, developing godly confidence, striving for greatness, choosing a career, biblical masculinity, and so much more.”
Young men have been attracted to conservative Joe Rogan’s podcast, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” which has held the top spot on Spotify’s podcast rankings for several years. Eighty percent of Rogan’s audience is male. And for the past few years, Tucker Carlson’s podcast, “The Tucker Carlson Show,” has come close to Rogan as the most listened-to podcast on Spotify.
Realizing that they have been unable to influence potential young voters, the Democrats are now attempting to replicate the Joe Rogan Experience by creating their own Rogan. They are unlikely to succeed because commentators like Joe Rogan or Tucker Carlson are authentic, and their followers are attracted to that authenticity. They know that Rogan and Carlson were not created in a focus group lab like the Democrats are attempting to do by gathering at luxury hotels where they are hiring consultants to help them figure out a way to win male voters by studying what they have identified as the “syntax, language and content that gains attention and virality in these spaces.”
Code-named SAM (Speaking with American Men: A Strategic Plan), the Democrats are spending 20 million dollars to try and win elections again by creating a Frankenstein Rogan who will spout progressive platitudes. Even the New York Times mocked such folly by suggesting that the Democrats’ projects “can read like anthropological studies of people from faraway places.”
The trends are clear. Young voters — both male and female — are tired of being lied to by their lawmakers, their institutions, and sometimes even by their high school and college leaders. They suffered through the COVID years and endured four years of an addled president who could never have provided the kind of leadership they were looking for. Conservative Republicans can build on this as long as they commit to being honest and trustworthy. Young leaders like JD Vance and Marco Rubio can continue to inspire young voters and reassure them that they will be the ones who can rescue them from a political and economic system that has failed them.
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