It’s no secret that when you attend Tea Party rallies and events, you see many middle-aged men and women waiving Don’t Treat on Me flags, but one demographic is largely absent – young people.
“We’d love to have more young people,” said Tea Party Patriots National Coordinator Diana Reimer.
However, the movement lacks an organized outreach to young Americans, according to Reimer.
A 2010 Gallup poll found that only 16 percent of those aged 18-29 called themselves Tea Partiers.
But other movement leaders say that young Americans who are already involved in the movement online are not prone toward attending large rallies or in being closely associated with their elders.
The Internet and social media has completely altered how campaigns and activist movements operate compared with 2008 when Barack Obama ran the first time – let alone like back 1996 when young conservatives supported Bob Dole against Bill Clinton amid a similar political climate.
“The Internet was nothing at all like it is now,” said Amy Kremer, director of Grassroots and Coalitions for Tea Party Express. “Kids now are used to instant communication. It’s easy to see how the Internet has changed the political world since 2008.
“Sarah Palin breaks her news on Twitter. And it allows young people to not have [to be labeled as conservative].”
And even if they don’t join their elders in the streets or at rallies, they are active supporting Tea Party values online, according to high-profile Tea Party leaders, which follows a similar pattern making itself known in the Occupy movement on the left.
“The Tea party is already reaching those voters,” said Tea Party Patriots co-founder Mark Meckler. “You see them online spreading information online using social media. It’s a question of how you label people.”
Many young conservatives and libertarians do not care much for the Tea Party label or any label for that matter, but Meckler another leaders in the Tea Party movement say they are actively involved with pushing Tea Party values nonetheless.
“There are alot of people who believe in Tea Party values who are engaged in politics, but who don’t call themselves Tea Partiers or never will,” Meckler said.
According to Meckler, Facebook tallies of the 800,000 or so individuals who participated in the Tea Party Patriots’ online activist discussions showed that each age demographic from 25 to 85 was evenly represented prior to his February 2012 departure from the group.
“It’s like it was with Obama in 2008, young people are not coming to mass rallies but are engaged online through social media,” Meckler said.
And the sour economy has served as a motivated a lot of young conservatives to increasingly get involved, Kremer told Red Alert Politics
“What are their priorities?” Meckler asked. “I’d argue that a lot of people young concerned about debt and deficit. Young people more affected by them these issues than people over 50.
“They align with the Tea Party on the free-markets issue, but there is less angst among them about the Constitution than among other people. I’d argue they are already engaged in the movement.”
Tea Party leaders suggest that the Ron Paul movement has a lot in common with the Tea Party, especially when it comes to opposition to bailouts and crony capitalism and that its members could be considered Tea Partiers even if they eschew the label.
“Really, at the end of the day we need to speak to young people to say we share their values,” said Alex Cortes, a young conservative who speaks at Tea Party events and currently serves as executive director of the activist group Let Freedom Ring. “Take spending, it’s one of the issues of the Tea Party. President Obama has added $30k new debt to every taxpayer. Youth have to pay more than everybody else.
“Young people really do love freedom. They love the Constitution and they love freedom. The Tea Party has a lot of influence on the political landscape.”
Cortes likewise suggests the Tea Party has increasingly moved more toward online activism than toward physical rallies, which he says benefits younger Americans living in the social media age. Google and Facebook allow the movement to do a better job of targeting younger conservatives and to get them organized.
”Where ‘s the Tea Party movement? We’re online,” Kremer said. “The Tea Party moving to Tea Party 2.0, which is online now instead.”
Kremer argues that online activism is more effective when it comes to affecting change than large rallies.
