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Gen Z was supposed to be a left-wing cohort. Zoomers, we were told, championed wokeness; they would “save us” from the rise of the alt-right and inequality; they were engaged, ready to disrupt old systems and oppressive regimes. But cracks have emerged in the image.
The popularity of misogynistic influencers like Andrew Tate, the rise “tradwife” movement among under-30s, and the growing evidence that young people admire right-wing figures show that Gen Z’s politics are something more complicated.
Given this, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that so many supposed Trump critics celebrated his bid to save TikTok last week. A Supreme Court ruling on 17 January mandated TikTok to sell to an American buyer or shut down in the US entirely. Two days later the app went offline. But, by the end of that same day it returned, crediting its salvation to Donald Trump and his executive order halting the ban. “As a result of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is back in the US!” read a notification pushed by the app to American users. The response was overwhelming: influencers – and not just conservative ones – rejoiced at TikTok coming back online, thanking Trump for this 11th-hour intervention. Many popular creators who were once vehemently anti-Trump – and who even campaigned for Kamala Harris – were sincerely celebrating his executive-order promise.
“Now I’m rooting for Trump?” one of these popular influencers posted, “Make America fucking Great Again, I guess!”
Trump was aware that saving TikTok would play well with the younger demographic. At the inauguration the same strategy was on display: among the tech billionaires and right-wing talking heads, some of the most prominent attendees were podcasters and YouTubers, such as the brothers Logan and Jake Paul – who are consistently cited as some of the most well-liked influencers among teenagers – in both US and worldwide surveys – and Theo Von, a middle-aged podcaster who hosted both Trump and Vice-President JD Vance on his show during the election campaign. This is a conscious attempt to court the youth’s favour.
Of course, there are some who won’t be moved by such gestures. Within Gen Z there are swathes who push back against right-wing ideas about gender, class and work. These young leftists won’t fall for the obvious appeals to their demographic, whether it is rubbing shoulders with podcasters or “saving” TikTok, even if they are pleased to see the app back on their home screens.
But these people do not speak for Gen Z as a whole. This mosaic generation increasingly accommodates right-wing views, and Trump has been gaining influence with them since 2020. According to post-election analysis by Tufts University, nearly two thirds of young white men (aged 18 to 29) who voted in November 2024 chose Trump, along with almost half of young white women. The same proportion (49 per cent) of young Latino men also gave Trump significant support. Compared with 2020, Tufts claims, “young voters in 2024 were more likely to identify as conservative and as Republican”. And, the analysis concludes, “the young moderates who cast ballots were more likely to vote for Trump”.
And this is resonating in popular culture. Writer Brock Colyar described this new type of conservatism in an Intelligencer profile titled “The cruel kids’ table”. “They are not disenfranchised or working class or anti-elite or many of the other adjectives used to describe Trump supporters since 2016. Rather, they are young, imposingly well connected, urban and very online.” One crisis consultant who works with conservative podcasters told Colyar: “Maga is MTV for Gen Z. This isn’t the fringe. This is youth pop culture.” The piece also noted that the conservative Power 30 awards honouring influencers who advocated for Trump during the election – “the event to be at if you were under the age of 30 and very online” – the night before the inauguration was sponsored by TikTok.
It seems we are not at the peak of this rightward shift. And while millennials and some parts of Gen Z will still have strong memories of how his anti-establishment populist bent played out during Trump’s first presidency, we shouldn’t forget that a lot of Gen Z were too young to seriously remember politics pre-pandemic. This group will be encountering Trump’s shtick as adults (or even engaged teenagers) for the first time, without any of the understanding that Trump’s promises have failed to deliver meaningful changes for their social and economic prospects.
The TikTok story isn’t over – Trump’s executive order has merely halted the sale for 75 days, at which point the company may no longer have to sell or may have to contend with further legal battles. But the reality is that Trump doesn’t even need this friendly airtime to gain favour among young Americans. They are already lining up to support the causes he has become a willing mascot for. “Saving” TikTok may be a moment where Trump does manage to capture the attention of a previously untapped audience, but it is more likely to be remembered as a moment when he was simply pushing through an open door.
[See more: DeepSeek has exposed America’s AI fiction]