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636

Baby boomers are fleeing Donald Trump and switching allegiance to Harris (www.independent.co.uk)

submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

120 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Voters over 70 are backing Harris over Trump, 51 to 48 percent, Emerson College poll finds

A new poll shows some baby boomers and members of the Silent Generation are switching allegiances from former President Donald Trump to Vice President Kamala Harris.

The Emerson College poll released Thursday shows voters over 70 backing Harris over Trump 51 to 48 percent. That’s a small but positive shift for Harris, as last month, 50 percent of the group supported Trump while 48 percent backed President Joe Biden, who dropped out of the race and endorsed Harris last month.

The group includes some baby boomers, who were born between 1946 and 1964, and the Silent Generation, born between 1925 and 1945.

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[–] [email protected] 150 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

How about that. Harris moves to the left on domestic economic issues, and boomers switch to her. Even as prominent Republicans call her a commie.

Conventional "wisdom" within the centrist wing of the party is that we have to move to the right because boomers will flee in panic if we dare move to the left. Turns out, centrists have been full of shit this entire time. We've wasted so many years moving to the right for a lie. What else are centrists full of shit about?

[–] [email protected] 71 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (11 children)

Harris moves to the left on domestic economic issues, and boomers switch to her.

You might be making a classical correlation is not causation mistake here. There are a lot of separate reasons to prefer Harris over Trump.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Where were you for the past few decades when centrists were gleefully announcing that all wins are because they moved to the right, and any losses are because they were too far to the left?

[–] [email protected] 25 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Here in Europe, where we are not burdened by two-party systems :-|

[–] gravitas_deficiency 37 points 3 weeks ago

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

Except the UK (and Belarus I guess). Imo OPs statement rings true for British politics as well

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

In Europe, literal fascists are elected to parliament.

Let's not jerk ourselves into a frenzy here.

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[–] [email protected] 41 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

What else are centrists full of shit about?

They're full of shit about being "centrist". Every word uttered by a conservative is deception or manipulation. Every word.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 weeks ago

What aren't they full of shit about?

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 weeks ago

Literally everything.

[–] [email protected] 104 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

did they finally realize GOP is going to take everything away from everyone who isn't a billionaire and give it to billionaires? like they started in 16?

[–] ironhydroxide 80 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Started in `16? I think you meant '81.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I mean the Business Plot was in ‘33

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

'29

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

The concept crystalized at the core of the Republican party in the 1960s

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[–] [email protected] 93 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (10 children)

After 8 years of Trump on the national stage I think some formerly captured boomers are starting to get bored of the bullshit. At some point even cultists wake up one morning and say, "oh, it's porridge and word salad again, fuck me, will we ever get anything more than empty promises." His recent speeches are embarrassing. Vance is a joke. The republican party is completely morally and ethically bankrupt.

[–] [email protected] 40 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Sooo many boomers I know were so annoyed with Trump v Biden, saying "Anyone but these two."

They got their wish.

[–] [email protected] 40 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

“The first party to retire its 80-year-old candidate is going to be the party that wins this election." ~Nikki Hailey

Looks like she might have been right.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

If she'd been nominated instead of Trump the GOP would win on a walk.

2 Democrats haven't been elected into office twice in a row since before the Civil War (a VEEPS were elevated to the office through deaths) - this should have been easy for the GOP, but instead they nominated the most-divisive politician in American history.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Ehhh lots of the GOP is openly racist and wouldn't vote for someone of Indian descent.

2 Dems haven't won in a row after an 8 year term, combined with a race with no incumbent/former president, I think that'd be an open race.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

I really hate these headlines. 1. The actual shift is tiny (don’t get complacent). 2. Soon enough the media will be bored and cherrypick some numbers that are good for Trump generating new headlines. Anything to ensure the debate is not about policy.

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

The old people I know are happy to volunteer that other old people need to get out of the way for the younger generation.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago

As an old person, I approve this message. It's exhausting to keep screwing things up for everyone that comes after us.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (8 children)

When it comes to Harris’s running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, 39 percent of voters have a favorable view. The same number has a favorable view of Trump’s number two, Ohio Senator JD Vance.

But 49 percent of voters have an unfavorable view of Vance while only 39 percent have an unfavorable view of Walz.

I can't believe Walz and Vance have the same favorable view.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

That's what you get when fox news spouts outright lies and deception 24/7, when facebook controls the algorithm and gives zero fucks about content moderation, when campaigns are able to spend millions on attack ads, etc.

The U.S. election system is a joke.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

He's nationally unknown. As people get to know him more you'll see his favorable grow. Vance's won't.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 3 weeks ago

That's all well and good, but let's hope we see the fruits of this swing at the ballot box.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

I think a lot of people forget what the world was like when the older baby boomers came of age.

[–] explodicle 7 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

I mean yeah, the only people who could feasibly remember are starting to forget stuff.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 weeks ago (6 children)

...

what.

No, WAT.

... I ... they ...

there's ... how the

Am I fucking dreaming?

Did I fucking DIE on the morning of July 21st 2024 and ALL of this has been nothing but a manic hallucination as all my neurons fire off for one last time?

what i mean is, i honestly thought the boomers were beyond help???

I could have SWORN they stopped giving a shit about anything but enriching themselves and fucking over their kids and grandkids and great grandkids just for the sake of their own sick amusement an entire decade ago.

I am legitimately astonished that there's a scrap of decency left in them to even COMPREHEND supporting anything but absolutely the worst of all available wrong decisions.

there's actually some part of me that wonders if kamala actually winning the support of THEM could actually be some kind of red flag... O_o; I'm not going to entertain that part or cultivate it, i'm going to starve it into atrophy now that i've expressed and confronted the thought, but still, this is such a shock that it was actually there.

[–] Skoobie 26 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I mean, or it's just true that no group is a monolith and that even the misguided can change course. It's a good thing that was never impossible.

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[–] phdepressed 18 points 3 weeks ago

Republicans are coming for their old people benefits. They want to gut Social Security and Medicare. Any old person that has a scrap of intelligence hearing that is simply following their own self-interest to vote Democrat. Also helps that most young people in their lives are probably talking about Harris positively. We'll see if that pans out at the polls.

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