MAJOR PARTY NOMINEES STRUGGLING WITH NEXT GENERATION …
There’s a new Pew Research Center report out on the U.S. presidential election – one that shows Democrat Hillary Clinton leading “Republican” Donald Trump by a 41-37 percent margin.
Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson is currently drawing 10 percent of the vote, while Green Party nominee Jill Stein is backed by four percent of registered voters.
Based on his recent trajectory, that’s actually a pretty good showing for Trump – and it could conceivably improve if he is able to stay on message.
Both major party candidates are struggling with younger voters, though.
According to the Pew study, registered voters between the ages of 18 and 29 support Clinton by a 38-27 percent margin, with 19 percent backing Johnson and nine percent supporting Stein.
Why does this matter?
Well, Democrats have dominated – and depended – on mobilizing the youth vote in recent years. U.S. president Barack Obama cleaned up in this demographic – drawing at least 60 percent of young voters last go-round, according to the American National Election Studies (ANES).
Here’s some other info from the survey …
(Pic via Pew)
Pew’s survey also found a much higher instance of “negative voting” in 2016 than 2008. For example, 53 percent of GOP voters said they were casting their ballots “against Clinton” while 46 percent of Democrats said they were going to cast their vote “against Trump.”
By comparison, in 2008 only 35 percent of GOP voters said they were voting “against Obama” compared to only 25 percent of Democrats who said they were voted against “Republican” nominee John McCain.