How Young G.O.P. Leaders Sold Out Their Generation

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May 31, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ET
By Charlotte Alter*

Once upon a time, a shiny new trio of young conservatives — Ryan Costello, Carlos Curbelo and Elise Stefanik — wanted to help build a modern, millennial Republican Party. The 30-somethings, all sworn into Congress in 2015, understood that millennials often agreed on many of the nation’s core problems, and believed it was up to them to offer conservative solutions. They were out to create a new G.O.P. for the 21st century.

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It was clear, even then, that millennial voters across the political spectrum cared more about issues like racial diversity, L.G.B.T.Q. rights and college affordability than their parents did. Polls showed that young Republicans were more moderate on some issues than older ones, particularly on questions of immigration and climate change.

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Ms. Stefanik’s rise — and her colleagues’ fall — is not just a parable of Trumpism. It’s a broader omen for a party struggling to reach a 21st-century electorate. She ascended by embracing a movement that is all about relitigating the past rather than welcoming the future. Now she and other new Trump loyalists in Congress are caught between their party and their generations, stuck between their immediate ambitions and the long-term trends. The G.O.P. has embraced a political form of youth sacrifice, immolating their hopes for young supporters in order to appease an ancient, vengeful power.

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Contrary to conventional wisdom that young people are always liberal and older people are always conservative, most voters form their political attitudes when they’re young and tend to stay roughly consistent as they age. And anti-Trumpism may now be one of the most durable political values of Americans under 50. By the end of Mr. Trump’s presidency, after the Jan. 6 insurrection, almost three-quarters of Americans under 50 said they strongly disapproved of him. Even young Republicans were cooling off: According to a new CBS poll, Republicans under 30 were more than twice as likely as those older than 44 to believe that Mr. Biden was the legitimate winner of the 2020 election and roughly twice as likely to believe the party shouldn’t follow Mr. Trump’s lead on race issues.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/31/opinion/elise-stefanik-trump-republicans.html

*Ms. Alter is a senior correspondent at Time and the author of “The Ones We’ve Been Waiting For: How a New Generation of Leaders Will Transform America.”

[Takket]

1. the drumpf party's problem is they aren't a political party anymore

they are a culture war party worried about what bathroom a trans person uses or "all lives matter". they live in complete opposition to anything Democrats stand for.

While cultural issues matter to Democrats as well, for the drumpf party there is no interest in anything else. They don't actually care or propose anything for issues like trade or science or wall street reform. Those things are all quashed in the back room dealings by the old guard to make themselves rich while the other 99% of rethugs are kept in a constant state of panic that two men somewhere are having a wedding.

The idea that the rethugs are in any way interested in softening their stances to appease millennials is laughable. They are only pushing harder and harder in the opposite direction.