Young independents grapple with frustration over the two-party system
Amid political polarization across the country and lack of faith in the two-party system to solve people’s problems, a large number of younger Americans say they have abandoned both the national Republican and Democratic parties.
Amid political polarization across the country and lack of faith in the two-party system to solve people’s problems, a large number of younger Americans say they have abandoned both the national Republican and Democratic parties.
The new NBC News Stay Tuned Poll, powered by SurveyMonkey, asked 19,682 American adults about the current state of U.S. politics as President Donald Trump approaches his first 100 days in office. The results show 64% of independents have an unfavorable opinion of the Democratic Party and 71% have an unfavorable opinion of the Republican Party. Those high unfavorable numbers were about the same among Gen Z independents, too.
Meanwhile, Gen Zers and millennials were more likely than Gen X and baby boomers to identify themselves as independents. And it’s under these uncertain conditions that many voters are coming into politics without strong ties to the traditional parties.
Corruption and corrosive politics were a major concern among other young independents who spoke to NBC News, including Nathan Gong, 19, who is a student at the University of Texas at Austin.
“It’s a bipartisan problem” that members of Congress have to spend so much time fundraising “instead of legislating and being serious about solving problems for their constituents,” Gong said.
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