You need to actually get out and talk to people if you think that 18-22 year-olds are conservative. Even in Nebraska these people are pot-smoking LGBTs who hate rich people. I just don't believe that in swing states, young adults are big fans of GOP candidates. I don't think people realize how dramatic of a shift this would be. I'd believe Trump winning 30-40% of the black vote before I'd believe him winning the youth vote. Young voters loving Trump (and beyond that, Republicans!) would be the biggest upset in all of American electoral history in my opinion.
I think for a lot of young voters, who they support is less about policy and more about identity.
I know quite a few relatively disengaged young friends who are Trump supporters almost purely for identity reasons - mainly it helps with their brand of being the “cool rebellious young guy”. I think they don’t yet see that elections actually have consequences and haven’t really considered the policy aspect.
It’s sort of simillar to how a lot of blacks who’s policy beliefs might align more with Republicans continue voting Democrat - it’s in large part due to identity and social pressures around them.
I've seen that too, but "cool rebellious young guy" (aka, an incel) is still very much a minority. A bisexual 20-year-old with a diverse group of friends who thinks Republicans are racist and thinks corporations are raising prices for no reason is much more representative of the average young voter than the Trump supporter is.
The nice thing about all this is that Trump has been around for a decade, so we don't need to deal with hypothetical examples.
All of these talking points went around back in 2015-2016. Gen Z is the most conservative generation since the Silent generation, was a common talking point among internet conservatives back then. Trump had youth appeal. Conservative memes were mobilizing young Republicans. Ben Shapiro thug life compilations. Hillary is out of touch and has been around for too long. We've had this conversation before and we didn't see this surge of support for Republicans among young people.
