Over at the Washington Times, Ben Domenech writes an op-ed entitled, “Getting the youth vote.” Domenech’s overarching argument is this:

It’s time for the face of conservatism in America to stop being a group of old-money gentlemen and ladies who came into politics fighting the Reds. It’s time to stop writing off the youth vote.

Of course, all of us here at NextGenGOP have been writing that we need to “stop writing off the youth vote” since our inception.  However, Domenech makes a statement that I found to be a little disconcerting (emphasis added):

But those on the right do not need the support of a majority of young voters to achieve electoral victory. They should not aim to win a majority of the youth vote, but rather to contend for it, to restore the close margin of the older, post-college under 30s.

In other words, all Republicans really need to do is restore the status quo; we need not worry about making any additional gains among young voters.  No disrespect to Mr. Domenech, but it is this attitude that has resulted in the GOP becoming seen as the party of older generations, and that has lost us so many young voters.  It is this attitude that gives young people the feeling that the Republican Party doesn’t give a damn about their vote.

And let us not forget that today’s youth vote will be members of the GOP’s core electorate in 20 years.  Because of this, we cannot afford to lose a generation of voters to Democrats.  Nor can we afford to make any assumptions that these voters will “come back” to the Republican Party as they grow older.  Therefore, although we must identify a short-term answer to win elections in upcoming cycles like 2010, we also must prepare for the future.  To do this, we need to build a long-term coalition of young voters who will support us in the decades to come, and whose children will hopefully also become Republicans.

In order to build such a coalition, we must be prepared to aim high and fight for every youth’s vote today.  I am not advocating a complete revamp of the Republican Party’s ideology simply to win these voters, as this would be preposterous, and of couse there are many young voters that we will never win over.  But we can take certain steps, like activating a Young Voter Outreach arm of the Republican National Committee that actively serves to sell young voters on the GOP.  If we successfully and genuinely demonstrate that the Republican Party is willing to seriously fight for every youth vote, I believe we will be incredibly surprised by the positive electoral results.

Last 5 posts by Aaron Marks

• Onward and Upward: Building a Sustainable Majority - January 22nd, 2010
• Dear Young Voters: This Is What You Get When You Don't Vote - December 1st, 2009
• The Youth Vote and the 2009 Elections - November 6th, 2009
• The Best of the Post-2009 Election Spin - November 5th, 2009
• Introducing NextGenGOP Executive Director James Kane - October 20th, 2009