In his historic inaugural address, President John F. Kennedy famously said, “Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation.” He had just won the presidency by the slimmest margin in history. The year 2020 produced another narrow presidential election. The Republican Party, to borrow a sports phrase, is in a “rebuilding year.”

As Republicans consider their prospects in the 2024 presidential election, they must realize that there is a generational shift occurring among their emerging leaders and potential presidential candidates. Since the presidential election of 1988, every Republican president (George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, Donald Trump) has been a scion of inherited wealth. In the same time period, every Democratic president (Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and, presumably, Joe Biden) has spent an entire career working in government.