AP Photo/Lucas Peltier
- Ahead of November, young Black voters are indicating that their turnout could fall below 2020 levels.
- A Washington Post-Ipsos poll revealed that only 41% of young Black voters said they were certain to vote this year.
- It's a number that is sure to alarm Democrats, who are working to boost minority support in 2024.
In 2020, Black Americans were instrumental in sending President Joe Biden to the White House, buoying his candidacy not only in the Democratic primaries but in the general election.
Biden won 92 percent of the Black vote overall that year, while also easily winning millennials and Gen Z voters, according to the Pew Research Center.
But Biden in 2024 is facing the biggest challenge of his political career, as his campaign works to rev up enthusiasm among his 2020 supporters as many of them remain disenchanted about the economy, the conflict in Gaza, and setbacks on everything from voting-rights legislation to student-debt relief.
And among young Black voters aged 18 to 39, voter enthusiasm remains low, according to a Washington Post-Ipsos poll conducted in April, a problem that threatens Biden's reelection and down-ballot Democrats in key races across the country.
Overall, 62 percent of Black voters indicated that they were "absolutely certain to vote" in November, a decline from the 74 percent of Black voters who made the same statement in June 2020.
However, among the youngest cohort of Black voters — aged 18 to 39 — only 41 percent said they were "absolutely certain to vote." The number marked a steep decline from June 2020, when 61 percent of voters in this age group indicated that they were certain to vote.
Among young Black women, 39 percent of respondents said they were certain to vote this year, a sharp fall from the 69 percent who gave the same response in June 2020.
Strikingly, 70 percent of Black voters aged 40 to 64 and 88 percent of Black voters aged 65 and older said they were "absolutely certain to vote," revealing stark generational divides that have become an increasingly visible problem for Democrats — who for decades have relied on Black Americans as their most loyal bloc of base voters.
Young Black voters — less likely to show the sort of allegiance to Democrats that older voters have maintained since the post-Civil Rights era — have made it known that they're on a different political wavelength than their parents and grandparents.
Even in 2020, scores of young Black voters were drawn to more progressive candidates like Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, while older Black voters lined up behind Biden — a familiar face who was seen as a political moderate and had built up goodwill as President Barack Obama's No. 2.
Biden is working to boost enthusiasm among Democrats — but especially among young voters — as he touts his administration's success in passing infrastructure legislation and its record of job creation. For the president, this push is especially critical in the swing states that he'll need to win reelection, but notably in Georgia, the battleground state with the highest share of Black voters.
And the engagement push will also be important for down-ballot Democrats in key House, Senate, and gubernatorial races, who'll need a strong presidential year turnout as they seek to overcome any boost in conservative turnout tied to former President Donald Trump's candidacy.