In the 2024 United States presidential election, Donald Trump accomplished something that had not been done by a Republican in over two decades: He got a majority of men aged 18–29 to vote for him.
While young men have been more likely than young women to vote for Republicans in modern elections, the gap has seemed to be less tangible because they both leaned left. Joe Biden, for instance, won young men by 11%, according to data from the Rutgers Center for American Women and Politics – until the two demographics split their ballots for the first time in a generation.
This is not isolated to the U.S. either. In Germany’s recent federal election, young men flocked to the far-right Alternative for Germany, while young women voted in large numbers for the left-wing The Left party. Polling aggregated by The Guardian shows that young men in South Korea voted for the conservative People’s Power party by 25% more than young women. This is not just an American phenomenon – across the world, young men are moving to the political right, while young women are moving left.
The most likely explanation for the growing partisan gap lies in the “culture war” between progressives and conservatives that has increasingly caused divisions on gender-based lines.
One such issue is that of feminism, which has become somewhat of a buzzword in recent years. According to a 2024 Ipsos poll, 60% of men worldwide believe that society has “gone so far in promoting women’s equality that [it is] discriminating against men.” This sentiment was shared by Thomas Park ‘27, who, while maintaining his support for issues such as abortion rights (another hot topic issue with a large gender divide in opinion), still felt as if feminism “could be taken [too] far to be unfair.”
On the LFA campus, like the rest of the world, the biggest divide between the political opinions of young men and young women might be how much they see their gender as an influential factor in their political beliefs. In a survey of 45 LFA students, while around 65% of both men and women identified as either “liberal” or “somewhat liberal,” only 16% of male respondents said that their gender had at least a moderate impact on their political beliefs, while 86% of female and agender respondents said the same.
Lydia Freeman ‘26 shared her point of view: “[I’ve found] the left to be more accepting of women… [marginalized groups] are more accepted by the left side.”
Even when it comes to having relationships, platonic or romantic, this growing divide has been a factor. 65% of male respondents to the survey of LFA students said that political divides were not factors in who they chose to date, while only 31% of female and gender queer respondents said that was the case for them.
Park and Freeman both shared these respective opinions. In Park’s eyes, “Talking with other people in general… I believe that politics is politics, it shouldn’t affect how you view the other person.” Freeman commented, “I think [that it’s harder to have conversations with guys because of a difference in beliefs] — girls, nonbinary and queer teenagers are more to the left than boys are… so I’m a little bit more weary at first.”
As an age group, young adults are the most left-leaning demographic worldwide. As the issues on which we define our beliefs change, though, so too do the ways in which new divides form. Only time will tell if this partisan gap between young men and young women will expand, contract or is simply the new normal in the United States and around the world.
