Kamala Harris is turbocharging her party’s support from millennials and Zoomers, reenergizing a Democratic voting bloc that had been bored with President Joe Biden’s campaign, a new poll finds.
The poll from the progressive youth voting group NextGen America, first shared with the Daily Beast, shows that Harris has vastly improved on Biden’s performance among voters under 35, beating Donald Trump in a multi-way survey, 53 percent to 36 percent. The president was ahead by a margin of only nine percentage points, 41 percent to 32 percent, when the group surveyed the race back in March.
A NextGen press release at the time said “Young Voters Lack Enthusiasm For Candidates, Motivated by Issues.” While policy still drives young people, the new poll shows Harris’ candidacy has restored enthusiasm across key demographics.
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Among young Black voters, Harris is crushing it.
She beats Trump among this group in the poll, 72 percent to 19 percent, blowing Biden’s lead—44 percent to Trump’s 27 percent—out of the water. The Trump campaign has been touting its gains among young male voters, including African Americans, who had long been considered among the Democrats’ staunchest supporters; the new poll suggests some of those gains are evaporating.
Veteran Democratic pollster Cornell Belcher told the Daily Beast that while he isn’t familiar with NextGen’s polling methods, the data makes sense.
“I would be very suspect of a poll that says the opposite,” he said in an interview. “She is running better with core constituencies, including among African Americans and younger voters, in battleground states as well as in congressional districts.”
NextGen’s poll found that young voters are more motivated to vote than they were in the spring. The share who are “extremely motivated” to vote went up from 68 percent to 78 percent, with 7 out of 10 young Democrats saying Harris increased their motivation.
Other young demographics also appear firmly back on board now that Harris is at the top of the ticket. She doubles Biden’s margin among young women, leading Trump 63 percent to 27 percent. And while the very youngest voters had been Trump-curious in March—the GOP nominee was actually leading Biden among those 24 and younger, 35 percent to 30 percent—Harris has pulled ahead dramatically, 58 percent to 34 percent.
Young people are just more into Harris than they are Trump.
Where Trump’s net favorability in the poll was at negative 25 points, with Biden’s clocking in at negative 26 points, Harris’ was at positive 4 points. And the so-called “double haters,” voters who dislike both Trump and Biden, have flocked to Harris as an attractive third option, with 68 percent of them supporting her compared to 6 percent backing Trump.
In partnership with Democratic firm Impact Research, NextGen surveyed 1,500 voters between the ages of 18 and 35 in the swing states of Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. The text-to-web poll was conducted from July 23 to July 30, right after Harris became the presumptive nominee.
The new poll tracks with a survey reported by Politico on Monday that showed Harris’ candidacy boosting enthusiasm among young people. Their engagement now matches what’s typical of older voters, who tend to show up at the polls more reliably. And Democratic enthusiasm, which had dipped during the long, gray slog of Biden’s campaign, has now returned to normal levels.
