Democrats ponder the 'manosphere'

Democrats know they have a problem with men, particularly the young men who have drifted away from them in recent years.

Democrats know they have a problem with men, particularly the young men who have drifted away from them in recent years.

But six months after the gender gap contributed to the party’s disappointing showing in last year’s election, top Democrats are still throwing spaghetti at the wall, lacking a unified theory on how to win these voters back.

Some are trying to break into the culturally conservative podcasts that have thrived at building big audiences of Gen Z men. Some are ceding ground on issues Democrats have long seen as sacred in the culture war, while others insist that the party’s current message will work. Some are pitching grand plans about funding a new influencer ecosystem that subtly boosts the left.

At the center of all of this is an acknowledgement that public opinion on the Democratic Party has dipped to an all-time low, men are souring on the party especially quickly, and losing ground with about half the voting population isn’t a recipe for success. It’s weighing heavily on the minds of Democrats while making Republicans giddy: On Friday, President Donald Trump needled Democrats for wanting to “spend money to learn how to talk” to men.

Jeff Horwitt, a Democratic pollster with Hart Research Associates (who conducts the NBC News poll with a Republican counterpart), told NBC News that a look at recent presidential exit poll results shows that “when Democrats do well broadly with men, they are competitive. When Democrats are not competitive with men, Democrats lose.” And while Horwitt doesn’t believe Republicans “have a lock on young men,” the GOP spoke to their economic anxiety in 2024 in a way that loomed large in 2024.