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This piece was copublished with , a nonprofit newsroom covering gender, politics, policy and power. 

On Nov. 5, 2024, men and women around the U.S. headed to the polls to decide a race hyped as a battle of the sexes.

By evening鈥檚 end, Kamala Harris鈥� quest to punch through and become America鈥檚 first female president lay in shambles. Donald Trump, the Republican Party鈥檚 undisputed since 2015, would return to the White House. And voters, especially the youngest ones, were themselves divided starkly on lines of gender.

As in each of the three previous federal elections, women鈥檚 support for the Democratic ticket considerably exceeded men鈥檚. But the gulf separating Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 was historically wide: According to , a data and analytics company that contracts with progressive organizations, Harris won the backing of 63% of women and just 46% of men.

The 17-point gap cleaving through Generation Z was not only bigger than that of every other age group; it was comfortably the largest Catalist had measured across four presidential cycles. of Trump鈥檚 approval conducted corroborated the same trend the following year, showing disparities between the men and women of Gen Z that eclipsed smaller splits among Millennials, Gen Xers, and Baby Boomers.

Jennifer Benz, a political scientist who leads the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, said findings like that were consistent across surveys she administered prior to the Trump-Harris contest, as well as exit polling conducted at the end of the campaign. Men and women for roughly a half-century, but it was unusual for newly minted voters to lead the way, she added.

鈥淲hat’s been notable about this younger generation is that the gender divide is already shaping up now, as opposed to when they age into the more typical partisan patterns we’ve seen over recent years,” Benz said.

While Gen Z鈥檚 gender gap is a relatively new phenomenon, its features can already be seen in K鈥�12 schools. They spring from the rancorous gender politics of the 2020s, which have left girls repelled by Trump鈥檚 policies and boys disaffected by Democrats鈥� seeming indifference to their concerns. 

As the youngest 鈥淶oomers鈥� enter high school this year, they appear to be accelerating toward the political 鈥� and often social 鈥� estrangement already evident among their older brothers and sisters. Their stories, based on interviews with 麻豆精品 and supported by the insights of educators and public opinion researchers, offer a rare snapshot of that polarization as it takes shape. In America鈥檚 college dorms and high school homerooms, young adults are , occupying separate online spaces and even demonstrating an aversion to dating.

Sarah Campbell, a high school teacher in Brunswick, Maine, said she鈥檇 noticed a pronounced change in her social studies classroom. Earlier in her career, students broadly approached discussions of politics and public policy with open minds. But over the past 10 years, a growing number have entered those conversations 鈥渁lready aligned with certain ideas.鈥�

鈥淚鈥檝e had girls talk about things like safety, rights or future opportunities in very real, personal ways, and in the same conversation, boys are questioning whether those issues are still relevant,鈥� Campbell wrote in an email. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e not just disagreeing, they鈥檙e experiencing these issues from completely different realities.鈥�

鈥楩eminism rooted in me鈥�

Those distinct worldviews may have origins stretching long before adolescence. Celeste Lay, a professor at Tulane University who studies how young people acquire political beliefs, noted that their beginnings overlap with children鈥檚 early attempts to fashion adult identities for themselves. 

“At the same time young people are going through political socialization, they’re also going through gender socialization,鈥� she said. 鈥淪o as they’re developing their politics, they’re learning what it means to be a boy or a girl and what society says those concepts mean.鈥� 

In , Lay and several co-authors used survey data from more than 1,500 children to determine when they start to examine the world through the lens of partisanship. They discovered that kids as young as six are already tottering down the path to the ballot box, and nearly half the study鈥檚 participants affiliated with a party by the age of 12. 

A high school senior named Lily was once such a novice partisan. Raised in South Lyon, Michigan, along the outskirts of Metro Detroit, she was encouraged by liberal-minded parents to take an interest in U.S. history and current events. When she was eight, the Democrats nominated the first woman to lead a major party鈥檚 presidential ticket. After that, her course was set. 

鈥淭his sense of feminism rooted in me because my parents were letting me educate myself,鈥� Lily recalled. “When Hillary Clinton was up against Trump, I was like, ‘There’s never been a female president! I have to support her.鈥欌��

A decade after that formative electoral heartbreak, she spoke to 麻豆精品 while taking part in the , a for-profit summer program offering learning experiences in a range of fields. Alongside a few dozen others with similarly arcane interests in bicameralism and campaign finance, Lily 鈥� whose last name has been withheld to allow her and her peers to speak freely about political matters 鈥� spent nine days last July at the Georgetown University campus. In between sessions role-playing as U.S. congressmen, the group made field trips to walk the halls of the Capitol in person.

Lily and her fellow government enthusiasts might reasonably be called some of the most civically engaged high schoolers in the nation. But countless girls her age followed a similar trajectory to both political consciousness and the political left. 

In the years spanning the Clinton and Biden administrations, the youngest female voters steadily warmed to the label of 鈥渓iberal鈥� ( ideological category). By 2023, Gallup research shows, the proportion of women aged 18鈥�29 who described themselves as liberal had leapt from 28% to 40%, while liberal men of the same age stalled at 25% over the same period. 

The evolution was not merely rhetorical. Teenage and 20-something women adopted on the environment, abortion, gun rights, marijuana access, the Israel-Palestine conflict and an array of other cultural issues. Today, the women of Gen Z are commonly regarded as voter demographic. 

Marie Sarnacki, an English and history instructor in South Lyon, contrasted recent waves of female students with those in her own graduating class of 2009. While stipulating that she spoke only for herself, Sarnacki added that girls in 2026 had far fewer reservations about voicing feminist beliefs on some of the most pressing questions of the day. 

鈥淚 don’t know if they would give themselves the label, but it’s safe to say they’re more open about their concern for reproductive rights or supporting classmates who are gay,鈥� she said.

The elephant in the room

Sarnacki believes that the ideological shift she has witnessed throughout 11 years in the classroom can be substantially explained by a corresponding development unfolding on the Right. 

Trump鈥檚 presidencies, each achieved through , have repeatedly pushed debates around sexism and women’s rights to the center of the national agenda, she argued. From the Women鈥檚 March to the #MeToo-inflected Kavanaugh hearings, the stunning demise of Roe v. Wade, and the president鈥檚 demeaning comments about various female antagonists, the Trump era may have hastened a leftward drift that was already in progress.

Daniel Cox, director of the conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI)鈥檚 , agreed with Sarnacki. While women have lately gained or even in some professional and educational spheres, he continued, many of the most 鈥渕omentous cultural events鈥� of the last 10 years led them to the conclusion that their rights were imperiled.

鈥淭hey were doing really well in higher education and high schools in terms of AP courses and graduation rates, and tons of statistics suggest that young women were comparatively doing better than men,鈥� Cox said. 鈥淏ut when they looked around politics and the culture, they were upset about a lot of things and became politically active.” 

Public opinion research provides clear signs that their dissatisfaction remains high during the second Trump presidency 鈥� and is equally vivid among those too young to participate in elections. revealed that, within a representative panel of children aged 13鈥�17, girls were vastly more negative than boys in their assessments of Trump (-38 from females versus -7 favorability from male respondents) and the GOP (-16 from girls and +2 from boys), while also much warmer toward the Democratic Party (+13 from girls and -5 from boys).

Trump鈥檚 macho stylings and media omnipresence play a crucial role in expanding the rift. Lily remarked that he has become an inescapable figure, whether in school or on social media. If anything, the president鈥檚 ubiquity was actually heightened by his reelection defeat in 2020, which lengthened his time in the spotlight.

“He’s so loud, with all the scandalous things he’s done,鈥� she said. 鈥淵ou can avoid the news, but you can’t avoid him.”

Another participant in the NSLC鈥檚 Georgetown session was Cate, a junior enrolled at a small private school in Louisville, Kentucky. Like Lily, she said she was motivated by societal injustice to become involved in politics. Her father is gay, and his experiences were part of what spurred her to activism. 

But whether engaged in private discussions with friends or public outreach through her school鈥檚 Human Rights Club, Cate felt frustrated by her male classmates鈥� lack of interest in the politics of Kentucky or the wider world.

She expressed particular disappointment with boys in her school who, she suspected, held views similar to hers but would not voice them out of fear of losing face with friends who 鈥渋dolize鈥� Trump鈥檚 brash manner. The gush of on platforms like TikTok helped foster a hero worship that was difficult to puncture.

It was understandable that young men would seek to emulate a powerful personality, Cate said, specifically citing the 2024 assassination attempt against Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania. The moment after that attack, when the then-candidate rose to his feet and exhorted his audience to 鈥渇ight,鈥� has become a centerpiece of at teenage boys, she said. Yet his influence heightened a dynamic in which 鈥渆mpathy is seen by this generation of men as weak, feminine.鈥� 

鈥淚t gets into all this misogyny,鈥� she lamented. 鈥淏ut women, who don’t care about that and can be empathetic loudly, are more able to share their political opinions.”

鈥榃here am I in this equation?鈥�

Girls were not alone in observing the stridency of gender conflict. Nor were self-described progressives the only ones to complain about its occasionally personal nature. 

Nathan, a junior from the prosperous suburban enclave of Westfield, New Jersey, struck a note of bemusement when describing an of the online right: left-leaning white women, a category encompassing many of the students he鈥檇 met that week at Georgetown. 

鈥淭here’s a stereotype that liberal white women are self-hating,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd supposedly it’s not feminine, and it’s not attractive, and it’s not manly if you support it.鈥�

Voluble and direct, Nathan described himself as a 鈥渞ight-winger,鈥� one of the few participating in the program. But he professed no admiration for political harangues mingled with sexism, and he objected to the treatment suffered by some of his gay classmates at home, who he said were frequently mocked in private. 

Instead, along with several other male students, he spent much of an hour-long conversation with 麻豆精品 lampooning the fixation of social authorities 鈥� including his school鈥檚 leaders 鈥� with identity politics. A multitude of perceived sins drew their attention, including the proliferation of various 鈥渉eritage months鈥� across the school calendar and the alleged maligning of the Founding Fathers in history curricula. The most annoying of these were dismissed as 鈥渧irtue signalling.鈥� 

Many politically engaged young men share Nathan鈥檚 perspective on the newfound prominence of equity-focused language and policies. 

This is, in fact, a key distinction between male and female Zoomers. According to , Gen Z men and their Millennial counterparts were only about half as likely as women to 鈥渃losely follow鈥� news coverage of social issues. And while the rising salience of such causes, including LGBT rights and abortion, have clearly played a role in politically activating many American women, they do not appear to have galvanized men to support Democratic candidates.

Catalist鈥檚 overview of the election results shows that both men and women became more likely to vote Republican between 2020 and 2024, but the gender gap across all ages was principally driven by men abandoning the Democratic Party. 

Monty, a junior from deep-blue San Diego, said that students attending his private high school were 鈥渆xtremely left,鈥� and typically surrounded by friends and family members of the same mindset. A strong impulse to activism also pervaded the halls, he added, attracting a number of his peers to Pride marches and No Kings rallies over the past year.

As Monty described it, the somewhat airless ideology of his school mirrored that of the larger progressive movement: Just as he鈥檇 periodically felt isolated during a long stretch of school assemblies commemorating the historic contributions of women and minority groups, a groundswell of 鈥渟tranded people鈥� were successfully targeted by the Trump campaign .

鈥淵ou have all these other groups represented, and then you have a generation of these young white males saying, ‘Okay, where am I in this equation? Because I’m not Black, I’m not a woman, I’m not LGBTQ, and I don’t know where I’m going to fit into this,’鈥� Monty said.

Rachel Janfaza is an independent researcher who writes the newsletter , which aims to surface the attitudes of Gen Z for a national audience by convening focus groups and listening sessions around the United States. In an interview, she said Democrats had 鈥渇umbled鈥� in 2024 with a critical group of potential male supporters.

鈥淵ou have all these other groups represented, and then you have a generation of these young white males saying, ‘Okay, where am I in this equation? Because I’m not Black, I’m not a woman, I’m not LGBTQ, and I don’t know where I’m going to fit into this.'”

Monty, student, San Diego

鈥淚 don’t think the Republican Party necessarily set out to attract young men from the start, but the Democratic Party being so coded as being friendly to women made it hard for young men to see themselves in that party,鈥� Janfaza said. 鈥淎 lot of the men I spoke to who voted for Trump in 2024 felt like they were still not being messaged to by the Democratic Party.鈥�

鈥楾his system doesn鈥檛 benefit us鈥�

Part of the difficulty in communicating to Gen Z is the fact that, beneath the level of partisan affiliation, perceptions of society and gender often differ significantly. 

Nowhere is this clearer than in the respective views of men and women toward feminism, a cause that has since the 1960s. Women have always been more keen than men to accept the label of 鈥渇eminist,鈥� but showed that over half of male Millennials said the term fit them personally; that figure was actually higher than the proportion of women from preceding generations who agreed with the description.

Yet far fewer of the youngest male respondents agreed. Zoomer men were only as likely as those in Gen X 鈥� a group more than twice their age 鈥� to call themselves feminists. Between that striking reversion and the leap in self-described feminism among younger women, Gen Z saw the widest gender gap on the issue of any age cohort. 

In the same survey, 23% of Gen Z men said they had experienced gender-based discrimination, a nearly fourfold increase over the oldest men included in the sample. Women are also increasingly likely to express this belief, with half of all Gen Z females saying they鈥檇 been discriminated against (compared with just 38% of Boomer women). 

Some fear that such sharp departures on fundamental questions will foment mutual resentment. Nathan, the New Jersey high schooler, said that boys his age were becoming embittered by a lack of recognition from the political left. In particular, he said that white males could be alienated from the Democratic Party in the same way that African Americans in the 20th century. 

鈥淚 think a similar situation is happening with young white men,鈥� Nathan said. 鈥淭hey’re like, ‘This system, this establishment, doesn’t benefit us in any way. We have no stake in maintaining it.'” 

Meanwhile, dramatic developments in the political realm can leave residue in the social one. The interpersonal relations of men and women are under greater strain than at any time in the past few decades, epitomized by exploring romantic relationships. While almost 90% of high school seniors reported that they鈥檇 gone out on at least one date in 1987, according to a recent poll by the Institute for Family Studies, only about half said the same in 2024. 

Competing partisanship seems to be at least partially responsible for the decline. In a by NPR and PBS News, 60% of Zoomers agreed that it was 鈥渋mportant to date or marry someone who shared your political views鈥�; by contrast, 62% of respondents aged 60 or older said that politics didn鈥檛 carry much weight in matters of the heart. A published last year on the American dating scene found that fully three-quarters of single women with a college degree said they would think twice before dating a Trump supporter.

Campbell, the Maine social studies teacher, said she had seen both sides of the dichotomy in her high school class. Girls are increasingly hesitant to pair off, or even socialize, with male classmates. Boys jokingly attack one another as “simps” 鈥� a slang term for men desperate for the attention of women 鈥� and have become “much more likely to push back” in class discussions of gender differences.

鈥淭he same way we find ourselves in social situations where we鈥檙e pressured to join some clique, that鈥檚 present in our political positions too. . . and guys experience that too. I just think they鈥檙e better at hiding it.鈥�

Lily, student, Pennsylvania

鈥淭here is almost a defensiveness in their attitude, as if I am trying to tell them they aren鈥檛 important and girls are,鈥� Campbell wrote. 鈥淚t is genuinely a shift that is concerning to me.鈥�

Lily, who now attends high school in State College, Pennsylvania, didn鈥檛 address her dating life. But she opined that the apparently right-wing outlook expressed by some boys may simply reflect their wish to fit in 鈥� an instinct with which she sympathized.

“The same way we find ourselves in social situations where we’re pressured to join some clique, that’s present in our political positions too,鈥� she said. 鈥淎nd guys experience that too. I just think they’re better at hiding it.”

What comes next?

Neither students, teachers, nor researchers could guess whether the gender gap would reverse with time or continue to grow.

In his sixth year in office, young women haven鈥檛 relented in their loathing for Donald Trump. In fact, it might be said that American women and the Democratic Party have , both measurably more feminist, more liberal, and more credentialed than they were a generation ago. According to Gallup data, is now a college-educated woman.

On the other hand, it is far from clear whether a sufficiently large number of today鈥檚 high school boys will reverse course and embrace the Democratic candidate in 2028. A of the semi-annual Yale Youth Poll showed that 68% of voters aged 18鈥�22 disapprove of Trump鈥檚 performance in office, a four-point increase since the previous fall; still, men in that age range actually became less favorable toward the Democrats during that same five-month span.

If national Republicans hope that disenchantment brings them an army of converts, they may find themselves disappointed. AEI鈥檚 Cox said the evidence from most polling and election results shows only that young men have become hostile toward Democrats 鈥� not that they have become doctrinaire conservatives.

鈥淚’m not even sure they like the Republicans that much, honestly,鈥� Cox said. 鈥淚t’s not so much that they’re attracted to the whole GOP agenda 鈥� it’s that, between the two parties, they’re looking at which one seems more receptive to the concerns they have.鈥�

Asher, visiting NLSC鈥檚 summer program from Pennsylvania鈥檚 solid-blue Delaware County, said he would have voted for the Democratic ticket in 2024 had he been old enough. The measured junior particularly came to admire Tim Walz after he was selected as Harris鈥檚 vice-presidential pick. 

Yet he critiqued the way in which the party sought to woo men as 鈥減andering,鈥� including launched to rally 鈥淲hite Dudes for Harris,鈥� and Walz鈥檚 . (The Minnesota governor later disclosed that he saw his ability to 鈥溾�� as one of his major contributions to the campaign.) 

Nathan recalled an episode that saw Walz join Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in streamed on the popular service Twitch. “They had the most artificial attempts to win over men,鈥� he marveled. 鈥淭im Walz and AOC playing video games, and you could tell they weren’t actually playing. No one related to that!”

Asher 鈥� happy to number himself among the relatively scarce white dudes for Harris, albeit one without a vote 鈥� said he hadn鈥檛 personally felt excluded from political debates with left-leaning classmates, but acknowledged that such conversations sometimes hinged on participants鈥� personal 鈥渃redibility鈥� to speak on specific issues. 

鈥淚 have seen that happen with people: ‘You don’t have female genitals, so you don’t get to have an opinion about abortion,’鈥� he said.

The Up and Up鈥檚 Janfaza said that similar complaints are a hallmark of her listening sessions with college undergraduates. Many feel as though their sentiments, goals and desires are so diffuse that they are 鈥渢alking past each other.鈥� 

鈥淲hen I ask young men and women, ‘Do you see a gender divide in your community?鈥� they are so quick to tell me that they feel men and women are on different playing fields,鈥� she said. 鈥淭his isn’t fun for anyone.” 

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