Pollsters agree that the presidential race has tightened significantly over the remaining weeks before Election Day, and that’s in no small part because of Donald Trump’s surge with millennial voters.
According to the latest YouGov poll, the Republican nominee has regained ground with the base of young Republicans since the first debate and now stands at 28 percent to Hillary Clinton’s 53 percent, an anemic number for a Democrat considering President Obama’s numbers in 2008 and 2012.
This was a massive 14-point rebound for Trump, who was suffering at historically low poll numbers after a series of controversies plagued the Republican nominee. At the beginning of October he stood at only 38 percent support nationally in a four-way race, and had a mere 15 percent among millennials.
To Trump’s benefit, Clinton’s campaign also saw a 5 percent decline with young voters this month after a series of controversial emails were revealed by WikiLeaks.
To his credit, Trump has tried to reach out to millennials in several speeches addressing their concerns on jobs and education. The billionaire promised to cap repayment of student debt at an affordable 12.5 percent of income, and pledged to protect free speech on college campuses and create a vibrant economy for college graduates.
Although these efforts should have been made much earlier in the campaign, the outreach may have gone far enough to make a sizable impact with a portion of young voters.
