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Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk cautioned Friday that the Republican Party risks losing support from the same young voters who propelled President Donald Trump to the White House if it fails to follow through on key promises.
“The biggest threat to the Republican Party in 2028 is if we do not deliver on our promises of homeownership for the next generation,” Kirk told Fox News Digital in an interview at the Turning Point Student Action Summit in Tampa, Florida. “The youth vote didn’t just vote for Donald Trump. Young voters put Donald Trump in the White House.”
Kirk discussed the future of the conservative movement, why Generation Z is trending rightward, and why tech giants are suddenly showing interest in engaging with Republicans.
I’M A YOUNG DEMOCRAT AND I’VE GOT TO ADMIT MY PARTY IS LOSING 2025 WHILE LOOKING AT 2028
The influential conservative media personality said there was no doubt that younger voters were trending conservative, and he believes that the shift was largely driven by losses from the COVID-19 pandemic. Canceled milestones like prom, graduation, and in-person learning had a huge impact on this generation, he said.
“There’s very low trust of institutions and the institutions have failed them,” Kirk said. “Primarily, if you’re 18, 19, 20, 21 right now, that kind of portion of Generation Z, they were lied to during COVID and so much of their livelihood and so much of what they care about, and they’re deeply passionate about was taken from them abruptly… So they’re a little bitter about that.”
Kirk also pointed to skyrocketing prices and record-breaking illegal border crossings under the Biden administration as driving factors behind Gen Z’s growing alignment with Trump. But he warned that unless Republicans can deliver solutions, the party risks alienating this emerging bloc of voters by 2028.
“If we don’t fix the homeownership problem in this country, the cost-of-living crisis, and if we don’t give the next generation [a chance] at being owners and not renters, we are going to see what I call ‘Mamdani-ism’ spread across the country,” he predicted.
CHARLIE KIRK WARNS ‘MAMDANI EFFECT’ METASTASIZING IN THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY WITH ‘GRIEVANCE-BASED POLITICS’
Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist assemblyman from Queens, soared to victory in New York City’s Democratic primary mayoral race on a hard-left platform that included freezing rent, city-owned grocery stores, free buses, free childcare, raising corporate taxes and massively increasing the minimum wage.
“Mamdani-ism is the radical element of the Democratic Party, which is bitterness, discontent, the mobilization of grievances,” Kirk said. “Where it is free stuff, populism weaponized against the American public.” He sees 2028 as a battle between two choices for America: an “optimistic” and patriotic vision where Americans take pride in ownership or one that follows more closely to Mamdani’s views.
Voters under 30 were the “decisive element” in the 2024 election, Kirk said, boosting Trump to victory in key swing states like Michigan and narrowing the gap in bluer places.
“So we must deliver for this cohort. We must show them that their lives are tangibly better, or else in 2028, we’re going to be in a much more competitive race than I’d like to be,” he said.
Big tech has also seemed to notice the generational shift to the right, with several Silicon Valley leaders appearing to want a friendlier relationship with President Trump in his second term.
Meta was one of the tech companies sponsoring the conservative event in Tampa. Kirk said he’s “thrilled” that Silicon Valley seems more open to conservatives after years of tension and hostility between the two over social media censorship.
With Kirk and other Turning Point figures’ success on social media, he thinks it should be a “no-brainer” for tech companies to seek a friendlier relationship with young conservatives.
“7,000 students, this is your target demo,” he said. “And secondly, we want to dominate on these platforms because, honestly, we already are. I mean, my personal Instagram, I think we’re upwards of almost 6.4 million followers. We get billions of impressions a year. You know, were very viral around TikTok. So I can’t speak for Mark Zuckerberg, but we’re thrilled to have Meta, Rumble and any other tech companies as well.”
Fox News’ Emma Colton contributed to this report.
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