Who Will Millennial Voters Back in 2012?

A couple of stories have come out in recent days looking at whether the youth vote, not to mention the enormous potential energy of younger voters, will line up a second time to support Barack Obama. Given that these sources have a decidedly conservative bent, it's not surprising to hear their wishful conclusions that the Millennial generation will ditch Obama in 2012.

First up is Elise Jordan, writing Monday in the National Review Online:

Young voters in 2008 were attracted to Obama as a symbol—no one knew exactly what he stood for, but voting for him sure did feel good. Nearly three years later, many of them are increasingly disgusted to learn that he apparently doesn’t stand for much. What’s his position again on gay marriage? On Afghanistan? On Iraq? Health care? The skyrocketing debt? They care little about having a symbolic leader when they can’t find jobs. The Hope and Change he promised have long since become a punch line.

And then there's Margaret Hoover, writing last week in the Wall Street Journal:

Since President Obama took office, the deficit has more than tripled and the debt has skyrocketed. Every dollar Mr. Obama has borrowed or spent is a dollar Millennials are going to have to pay back in the years ahead, in the form of higher taxes, a more sluggish economy, or both. Republicans can stress that while the Obama presidency has darkened the fiscal future, they have put forward solutions (such as the budget authored by Representative Paul Ryan) to jump-start the economy and salvage the safety net for Millennials.

Both authors make a compelling point about the potential among the under-30 set for dissatisfaction with Obama. This is a group that voted for the Democrat by a 2-1 margin over John McCain in 2008. The problem, of course, is the economy and the continuing awful employment outlook. Recent reports find that nearly one in five college graduates is out of work and that more than 17 percent of 16-to-24-year-olds who want jobs can't find them.

Jordan cites a survey by Generation Opportunity, a new Millennial organization founded by a former George W. Bush administration official, that reports three quarters of respondents say the Obama administration has failed their generation. Hoover thinks that Republicans should stay away from social issues and focus instead on "jobs, jobs, and jobs."

"Targeting young professionals and canvasing college students—people among whom the economic anxiety of the past two years is particularly acute and who face the highest barriers to employment—should be a main focus of the Republican effort," Jordan concludes.

No doubt, any of the Republican presidential campaigns will make inroads with this demographic on issues about the economy and opportunity. But the GOP has two obstacles in the way.

The first, as Hoover noted, is the growing pull of social issues in the Republican primary. Social conservatives have candidates unafraid of giving voice to anti-same-sex marriage and anti-abortion positions, and it's these campaigns that are gaining the most momentum among GOP voters right now. But that runs counter to polling that finds younger Americans are more progressive on social issues (much to the disbelief of conservatives who think Hoover is a RINO—Republican In Name Only—at best, or a Democratic operative at worst).

The second is that Obama has been laying the groundwork to appeal to Millennials on business grounds that aren't dependent on the number of jobs created or lost. In early July, the White House added pages to its website under the banner "Winning the Future: President Obama and Young Americans," in an effort to boost the president's cred with this constituency.

The theme the White House stresses here isn't traditional job development, but business creation through entrepreneurship. By establishing the Startup America program, Obama and his team have established a decent counter to GOP charges that he doesn't care about where the economy is headed or he doesn't have new ideas to push it forward further. Because Obama doesn't have the job numbers going for him, he'll have to rely on the perception that he supports business innovation.

Obama almost certainly won't get the same level of support from younger voters in 2012 as he did in 2008. A Washington Post/ABC News poll out this morning reveals significant erosion in support for Obama from key parts of his base, primarily liberals and African Americans.

But Republicans may be surprised to find that Millennials who ditch Obama aren't doing so to come to the GOP fold. They may follow the course set by past generations of younger voters and skip voting altogether.

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J. Jennings Moss is editor of Portfolio.com.