CNN
—
President Joe Biden’s support for the Israeli military offensive in Gaza, mixed with student anger over police crackdowns on anti-war campus protests, has engulfed classmates and other Gen Z voters ahead of this year’s election. The activities of the Democratic Party’s youth groups are becoming complicated.
“What would happen if I was talking about electric cars and climate change and[students]asked, ‘What about all the emissions caused by the bombing of Gaza?'” I was like, well, there. It’s like, we can’t help you,” said Hasan Pyarari, president of the University Democratic Party at Wake Forest University in North Carolina and chair of the national group’s Muslim Caucus.
“The same goes for access to abortion. And as an organizer, it’s so hard to understand these sets of facts that a lot of times you end up thinking, ‘Yes, that’s right,'” he said. Ta.
In his sharpest remarks yet, Biden on Thursday highlighted reports of anti-Semitic threats on campus and condemned what he called “disorder” at the demonstrations. “I support the right to protest, but I do not support the right to cause disruption,” he said. Asked whether the protests had caused him to change his mind about the conflict, the president said “no.”
Months of Israeli shelling of Gaza, launched in response to a deadly cross-border attack by Hamas on October 7, has left more than 34,600 people dead and the threat of famine looming, according to the enclave’s health ministry. ing.
The dire situation on the ground in Gaza is exposed to many young Americans in real time on a daily basis through social media apps like TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, and is exposed by many Democratic organizations, liberal outside groups, and others. It has emerged as a major concern for Biden allies. I am worried about the turnout of young people in the 2024 election.
These concerns arose last week when traditionally moderate American College Democrats issued a statement warning that the White House had chosen the wrong path with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the bear-hug strategy against the common cold. surfaced again. He will be responsible for the strategy for his base and for all Americans who want to see an end to this war. ”
“We must make it abundantly clear that calling for freedom for the Palestinian people is not anti-Semitism, nor is it an opposition to the genocidal actions of the far-right extremist Israeli government,” the group wrote. ing.
The decision by CDA leaders, who have long operated under the umbrella of the Democratic National Committee, to take such a bold stand and potentially jeopardize their standing with party leadership transcends ideological boundaries. It immediately attracted attention. But College Democrats say their concerns stem from the Biden campaign’s unwillingness to grasp how difficult it has become to engage young voters.
Polls of young voters paint a mixed picture regarding the impact of the Israel-Hamas war, particularly on the Biden campaign.
A poll conducted by Harvard University and the Institute of Politics in March showed that young Americans support a permanent ceasefire in Gaza (51% vs. 10% opposed). An April Economist/YouGov poll found that 32% of adults under 30 sympathize with Palestinians (compared to 13% who sympathize with Israelis). Only 18% of young voters approved of Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war, according to a Harvard University/IOP poll.
But a Harvard study also found that only 38% of young Americans closely followed news about the war. When asked which national issue they were most interested in, only 8% said foreign affairs.
Nico Fernandez, a 21-year-old student at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., admits he hasn’t been paying close attention to the Gaza conflict.
“This is a very complex situation and personally, with everything I have going on, with my internship and my studies, I haven’t been able to take a closer look at this situation,” Fernandez said. Ta.
The Economist/YouGov poll found that the majority of young people (63%) said they had never participated in any political protest, rally or demonstration.
“This is a different young electorate than in 2020 or 2022, and their motivations are different,” John Della Volpe, director of polling at the Harvard Institute of Politics, said in announcing the results. Ta. “Economic issues are a top priority, housing is a major concern, and the gap between the political preferences of young men and young women is significant.”
Biden allies frequently point to these constantly evolving dynamics as evidence that the domestic political stakes in the Gaza war are being exaggerated by critics. Santiago Mayer, founder and executive director of the Gen Z group Voters of Tomorrow, said anger over recent campus crackdowns has been directed more at university administrators and local officials than at Biden, and observers believe there is a gap between the two. He said that one should not draw a straight line. Student movements and how young people vote.
“I don’t really think the protests themselves are an election conversation. I think there’s obviously an election element to it, but that’s not what we’re talking about right now,” Mayer told CNN. . “It’s very important to remember that these young people, no matter how angry they are with Joe Biden, will never vote for Trump.”
But College Democratic National President Carolyn Salvador Avila, a student at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, cautioned that policy issues such as the cost of living, climate change and abortion rights are certainly most important to young people. For voters, Biden’s Israel policy threatens to undermine his personal standing.
“Even if it’s not at the top of the list, it’s a factor that makes people who would have fully supported this party not have 100% confidence that they will vote for Biden,” Salvador Avila said. Told. “There are a lot of people on our campus who are less receptive to our conversations about the great things our president has accomplished because of this issue.”
These divisions now exist at almost every level of institutional Democratic Party politics, from local party branches to Congress and even within the College Democratic Party itself.
Alison Bell, a graduate student at Meredith College in North Carolina and chair of the National College Democratic Jewish Caucus, said she was surprised by the group’s statement. One of the reasons for this, she says, is that she has been working closely with Mr. Pyarari, the chairman of the Muslim Caucus. Bell said an earlier draft included a more pronounced condemnation of anti-Semitism on American campuses.
Those versions were ultimately rejected by the group’s executive council, which voted 8-2 in favor of a statement more harshly criticizing Israel, Biden, and police raids on protest encampments. she said.
Bell said he was not consulted on the final draft, and that the “alienating” incident prompted College Democratic Party leadership to highlight “what Jewish students are currently experiencing across college campuses.” He believed that he didn’t want to do it.
“I support peaceful protests, even if those protests don’t necessarily align with my own beliefs,” Bell said. “But I think it was important to also include instances of harassment that we witnessed.”
The Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee did not address specific policy issues expressed by those groups, but instead pointed to the president’s recent comments and efforts to promote a ceasefire in the region. Biden campaign spokesman Seth Schuster touted investments to attract younger voters.
“We launched a stronger youth advocacy campaign earlier than ever before, led by a dedicated youth voting team. This campaign includes campus organizers in every battleground state and is already We are running seven-figure ads across the media,” Schuster said in a statement. “Our work is powered by 15 advocacy youth voting groups who leverage their networks and resources to mobilize young voters to re-elect the president and vice president.”
Among those groups is the College Democrats of America, which supports Biden’s re-election and says it remains committed to attracting young voters to the polls. Still, CDA leaders expressed frustration with what they described as snubs from the Biden team.
“It’s been very difficult for our organization to communicate with the White House and the Biden administration,” said Aidan DiMarco, the group’s membership director. “This is not new. At the time of this statement, nothing like this was happening. It has been an issue for a long time.”
Mr. DiMarco insisted the complaints were not personal, but a matter of simple campaign strategy.
“If the Biden campaign wants to win in November, they’re going to have to start building stronger ties with our organization because we’re grounded,” he said.
In Wisconsin, a key battleground state that could once again be decided by a close margin, Evelyn Schmidt, 20, chair of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater Democratic Committee, said her group is “trying to suppress two truths. ” he said. When it comes to Gaza and elections, it’s “our head.”
“We care about this and we want to be on the right side of history,” Schmidt said. “But at the same time, it’s about letting the people know (clearly) that the best situation for the presidency and setting that conversation is for Joe Biden to be re-elected.”
Democratic operatives working with young people and local party organizations outside the White House were also less likely to criticize Mr. Biden’s policies, although they said the conflict between Israel and Hamas has complicated their work. He said that As one longtime Democratic strategist put it, part of the reason is that the difficulty of solving the problem makes it difficult to debate on the campaign trail.
“The problem is there’s not much conversation to be had. It’s hard for young people to even talk to other young people about how to do this,” the Democratic strategist said. “When I work with state parties and talk to people in the College Democrats and people in the party’s youth councils, they ask, ‘How can I answer other young people’s questions?’ And that’s It’s a really difficult challenge. There’s a lot of emotion behind this issue.”
Schmidt said her group’s message to young voters angry about Biden’s handling of the war is simple, and she and her colleagues are being as direct as they can.
“We say, ‘If that’s your top priority, that’s not an ideal situation,'” Schmidt told CNN. “But in Wisconsin, many voters say their top issues are reproductive freedom, gun reform, and climate change.”
Still, she added, getting that message out day in and day out puts an added burden on young organizers.
“It’s frustrating because it puts a certain weight on individual organizers who talk to voters about how they should feel,” Schmidt said. “The weight of this issue is felt by the conversations organizers have to have.”
