Politics

Gen Z could decide the 2024 election. Here’s what they’re saying about Harris and Trump

Published

2 years ago

November 11, 2024

Blue Light Newsroom

Gen Z could decide the 2024 election. Here’s what they’re saying about Harris and Trump

Oct. 11, 2024, 9:01 PM UTC

By Allison Detzel

Veteran pollster Frank Luntz joined “Morning Joe” on Friday to discuss findings from a recent focus group he held with undecided Gen Z voters.

Luntz shared that, after watching the first — and likely only —presidential debate between Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harrishe assumed a gap would open up in the polling between the two candidates.

“I had thought that Trump’s debate performance would disqualify him,” Luntz said. “I thought looking at the two candidates side by side, which the American people had been waiting weeks and months to see, that, just as Biden’s performance cost him the nomination , Trump’s performance would cost him the election.”

However, that wasn’t the case: Polls show Harris and Trump remain in a statistical dead heat.

“I had thought that Trump’s debate performance would disqualify him.”

Since the presidential race remains so close – especially in the seven battleground states that will likely decide the election – Luntz said undecided voters will be essential to either candidate’s path to victory, particularly young undecided voters.

“Make no mistake, we are on a pin’s edge right now and the essential key point of this is that who they vote for is the next president of the United States,” Lunz told the “Morning Joe” panel.

According to one young voter, Chris from Florida, Trump’s debate performance did impact how he plans to vote in November.

“I think I’m gonna vote for Kamala Harris,” Chris said. “I just can’t get over what happened in 2020 and what’s been reaffirmed in the debates and the general statements made during the campaign.”

“It’s not just the riot but the alternative slate of electors scheme is a bridge too far for me,” he went on to explain.

Another participant, Angelo from New York, said he was previously leaning toward Harris but is now floating the idea of writing another candidate’s name on the ballot.

“The more I look back into it, the more I watch the debate, the more I look into her campaign, I just cannot trust her,” he said. “I’m not gonna vote for Trump but the more I think about it, the more I just don’t know if I can vote for Harris.”

That wasn’t the case for Ayshah from Iowa, who told Luntz that if the election were held today, she would cast her ballot for Harris.

“I just want to see what she will do because I know she’s gonna have to run again later,” she said. “So, I’m hoping she will be an exemplary president for this term.”

Abigail from Virginia said the discussion with her fellow Gen Z voters influenced her to look further into both candidates. However, she also expressed hesitancy in supporting Trump due to his actions in the days and months after the 2020 election.

“Trump, if he wants to win, needs to say less,” Luntz suggested. “If Harris wants to win, she needs to say more.”

“Some people said some things tonight that motivated me to do a bit more research,” Abigail told Luntz. “But the thing is, I do not want to vote for someone, I do not want to tell my children I voted for someone, that threatened democracy.”

“I need to analyze and think a little more before I just vote for Trump,” she said.

Reflecting on his conversation with the group, Luntz offered advice to both campaigns on how they can appeal to Gen Z voters in the closing weeks of the election:

“Trump, if he wants to win, needs to say less,” Luntz suggested. “If Harris wants to win, she needs to say more. They don’t like who Trump is but they agree with him on inflation and immigration. They do like what Harris represents but they still feel like she hasn’t been sufficiently forthcoming.”

“If she loses, it’s going to be because she didn’t answer the questions that voters had wanted her to answer,” Luntz said. “And if he wins, it’s because he finally realized he needs to say less, not more.”

Allison Detzel

Allison Detzel is an editor/producer for BLN Digital.

Politics

World Cup fuels ticketing reform demands

Published

10 hours ago

June 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Demands are growing for a political reckoning over ticket scams at the World Cup — and beyond.

The National Independent Venue Association and Fan Alliance, organizations representing and advocating for entertainment venues and artists respectively, sent a joint letter to Congress on Thursday, calling on lawmakers to ban speculative and ghost tickets, cases where resellers flog tickets they don’t actually have.

The letter — addressed to Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer — includes nearly two dozen accounts of fans who say they were scammed out of thousands of dollars trying to get tickets to the World Cup, which began last week. The groups are also asking fans to share their own stories with elected officials via the Fix the Tix Fan Action Center that launched last week.

“Every one of these stories erodes the public’s faith that consumers should and will be protected from fraud,” NIVA Executive Director Stephen Parker and Fan Alliance founder Donald Cohen wrote. “We urge Congress to work with us to prevent fraud like this in the future and finally enact ticket resale consumer protections that will protect Americans and ensure affordability.”

The letter flagged fans like Dacy Gillespie, who bought World Cup tickets for her sons on Christmas, only to learn on match day — months later — that the seller couldn’t deliver them. And Skylie Shore, who Parker and Cohen said spent well over $6,000 on tickets to the Scotland-Haiti match on June 13, but was forced to wait outside the stadium because she couldn’t access them as fans marched in on gameday.

“These examples reveal a consistent pattern: consumer deception, speculative ticket sales, and broken-hearted American families at the hands of resale ticketing companies like StubHub,” Parker and Cohen wrote.

In a statement, StubHub spokesperson Jack Sterne said that the platform does not allow speculative ticket sales, and blamed FIFA for users’ difficulty in accessing their tickets.

“We understand that attending the World Cup represents a significant investment in time and money, and we take our responsibility to every fan who books through our platform seriously,” Sterne said in a statement. “Many of the issues fans are facing trace back to the event organizer’s technology infrastructure, newly announced transfer restrictions, and a new app that was launched just a month ago.”

In response, FIFA said in a statement that the organization “can guarantee the validity and delivery of tickets purchased through its official platforms” and that FIFA.com/tickets “is the official ticket sales channel” for the tournament.

NIVA and Fan Alliance are urging congressional leadership to place universal price-gouging limits on ticket resale, enact stringent fines on perpetrators and a violation-reporting mechanism for ticket scams, and require secondary ticketing platforms to produce data on ticket fulfillment and consumer complaints.

The groups are not the only ones monitoring for evidence of shady ticket practices. Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway issued a consumer guidance in advance of the tournament, urging match-goers to beware of fraud and promising to hold offenders accountable. And the FBI in May put out a public service announcement, warning fans against purchasing tickets on copycat websites modeled on FIFA’s.

“With the World Cup coming to Kansas City, excitement is high and, unfortunately, so is the potential for fraud,” Hanaway said in her statement. “Missourians should be able to enjoy this once-in-a-generation event without fear of being deceived. My office will hold accountable anyone who seeks to exploit our families, and we stand ready to assist anyone who encounters suspicious activity.”