Some Cape Ann Gen Z voters and future voters are frustrated over their lack of choice of a candidate as incumbent Democratic President Joe Biden gets set to square off against former Republican President Donald Trump in a repeat of the 2020 election.
Among the six young voters interviewed about their feelings about the election by the Gloucester Daily Times in recent weeks were:
Alexis Armstrong, 23, of Gloucester, a Democrat, Ohio native, and a recent graduate of the College of the Holy Cross with a degree in political science. She plans on voting for Biden “not excitedly or enthusiastically.”
Sara Corchado, 25, of Rockport, has formerly lived in Chelsea and Gloucester, and is an independent voter who leans toward progressive issues. She plans to vote for Biden as the lesser of two evils.
Padan Coles, 22, is a graduate of Hamilton-Wenham Regional High who moved to Gloucester in her junior year of high school. She studies at Stony Brook University on Long Island in the clinical laboratory science program and is the vice president of her junior class. Coles identifies as a Republican.
Gloucester High students Finnian Wall, 17, Aurelia Harrison, 17, and Sofia Orlando, 18 are all editors of the high school’s student news site, The Gillnetter. Wall and Harrison turn 18 this summer and they intend to vote for the first time in a presidential election in November. Orlando did not vote in the March 5 Presidential Primary but is registered to vote in the fall. They all said they identify as independents.
What do they think about results of the primaries?
“I can’t say I’m not a little disappointed,” Armstrong said. “I think there was an overall understanding that after the 2020 election that we were entering a different administration, a different, you know, sort of American life. and now, you know, we are entering a sort of a rematch, which isn’t necessarily unprecedented but it’s not normal, either.”
“I think a part of me is very resentful of the fact that I have not experienced an election that hasn’t caused me to lose sleep,” Armstrong added, “and I haven’t experienced an election that follows, you know, the precedent that was set in American politics.”
“I think the country is very much divided,” Coles said. “I think it is swaying Republican but I also feel like as a young person, we are kind of ready to see new candidates. It’s not to say anything bad about Biden or Trump, but honestly, I feel like we are ready for a new candidate.”
“Unfortunately I keep seeing this headline ‘It’s the rematch no one wanted,’” Corchado said. “So of course I wish our options were better, but it’s just kind of the hand that we were dealt and the hand that I expected really. I think that our Republican candidate, he is very prominent in the country and very persistent, whereas Biden, who is actually a real politician, if you will, he hasn’t done the best that he can, either, so I just feel like we have to choose one of the lesser of two evils.”
“It’s very frustrating to be a Gen Z voter in this primary,” Corchado said. She wound up pulling a Republican ballot and voting for former South Carolina Gov. and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who dropped out of the race after the March 5 primary. Corchado wanted to pull votes away from Trump “but that clearly didn’t work.”
Harrison described the primaries as “relatively inevitable.”
“From the outset,” Harrison said, “I had pretty much zero confidence that anybody other than Trump or Biden was going to win the nomination, just because I don’t think the Democrats did a particularly good job of putting forth a viable candidate that wasn’t Biden and I think that … Nikki Haley gave it her best shot, I guess you could call it that, but I don’t really think that she had any real hope of winning.”
Orlando also believed the results of the primary were predestined.
“Nikki Haley, she did give it her best shot, like she tried her very hardest, but it was not going to happen that she was going to get the GOP nomination for the Republican Party,” Orlando said.
Wall was also disappointed in the way the primaries turned out.
“One, because it’s a rerun of the last national election which as inevitable as it was, it is a little disappointing given that, you know, they are both four years older, more scandal under their belts,” Wall said.
What issues are important to these young voters?
Wall said as someone planning to go to college, student loan debt is a big one. He said this needs to be fixed now so that his generation is not burdened with student debt in the way the two previous generations were.
Armstrong said her No. 1 concern is reproductive rights and preventing some sort of national abortion ban, while Orlando said reproductive rights and climate change are both pressing issues.
Armstrong cares deeply about the environment, noting how former President Trump had pulled the country out of the Paris Climate Accords. She said climate change is not getting better, but people who will address it aren’t being elected, either.
“It’s really disappointing to see what we are doing to our world,” Armstrong said.
Climate change is an issue Corchado cares about living in a coastal community like Gloucester that has seen its share of flooding incidents in recent months. She also spoke about her concerns with the reversal of abortion rights.
“That is just unprecedented. I never thought in my lifetime that that would happen,” Corchado said. “I never thought I would see that.”
Coles, who is planning to graduate from college soon, said the economy is a pressing issue.
“I think many people my age are getting stuck in a place where they are having a hard time finding a job even when they are entering the workforce. It’s not a real great economy out there and it’s not really allowing for much growth as an individual,” she said.
“I feel like reproductive rights and climate change are both pressing issues in this country considering how negatively … some politicians … portray both of those things in the media,” Orlando said
The Israel-Hamas War and the Ukraine-Russia War were also on the young voters’ minds.
Harrison has heavily researched the Israel-Hamas conflict and can see both sides of the complex issue.
“I think it’s a really good exercise for my generation at holding multiple truths inside us at once,” said Harrison, who also said environmental justice is a major issue in the election.
What they hope for in candidates
When asked if they were disappointed the parties could not come up with someone better or younger, Armstrong said it was not necessarily the parties, but citizens’ voting patterns that were at issue.
“I’m not President Biden’s biggest fan, he’s done a lot of things I disagree with, you know, some things I do like, some things I don’t … But I talk to a lot of people my age who are also not President Biden’s biggest fans and I think we ended up with Biden because of the former president,” Armstrong said.
Corchado said her biggest disappointment came from those who had dropped out of the race. She wished there was a choice of younger candidates who understood how the world works and who are going to be around for some time to see how the world is going to end up.
“I am ready to see a new younger candidate ready to represent us,” Coles said.
Wall said he would have preferred it if there were more than two parties to pick from.
“It is disappointing to have to go to vote for a candidate not because I am like, ‘Oh, I really like this guy,’ it’s like, ‘Oh, this guy’s all right but I really don’t want this other guy, that’s disappointing,” Wall said.
“I’ve had people call it ‘harm reduction,’” said Harrison, who liked candidate and philosopher Cornel West.
“I wish we lived in a world in which candidates like him could gain any sort of particular platform,” Harrison said.
“I feel like there could have been more options for candidates,” Orlando said. “But I feel like just having Trump or Biden against each other again, it just feels like a repeat of 2020 and I don’t think a lot of people want that again.”
Ethan Forman may be contacted at 978-675-2714, or at eforman@gloucestertimes.com.