The Republican Party is aging with its "core dying off by the day," making 2016 a tough task as more youthful voters reliably turn to Democrats,
Politico reported.
"Since the average Republican is significantly older than the average Democrat, far more Republicans than Democrats have died since the 2012 elections. To make matters worse, the GOP is attracting fewer first-time voters. Unless the party is able to make inroads with new voters, or discover a fountain of youth, the GOP’s slow demographic slide will continue election to election," Politico's Daniel J. McGraw wrote in the latest issue of its magazine.
McGraw used census data for his look into age decline at the GOP. He found that "of the 61 million who voted for Mitt Romney in 2012, about 2.75 million will be dead by the 2016 election."
By contrast, of those 66 million people who voted for President Barack Obama, close to 2.3 million are unlikely to live to see the 2016 election play out.
Said McGraw: "That leaves a big gap in between, a difference of roughly 453,000 in favor of the Democrats."
McGraw's voter turnout rationale drew laughs from electorate experts.
"I’ve never seen anyone doing any studies on how many dead people can’t vote," Brookings Institution senior fellow William Frey told Politico. "I’ve seen studies on how many dead people do vote. The old Daley Administration in Chicago was very good at that."
But even Frey allowed that, indeed, the GOP would need to do more to nab younger voters if it hoped to stay competitive in the future, and that includes staying out of the social issue debate and focusing on issues that matter to a younger generation.
Republicans do "rely too much on older and white voters, and especially in rural areas, deaths from this group can be significant,” Frey told Politico. “But millennials (born 1981 to 1997) now are larger in numbers than baby boomers (1946 to 1964), and how they vote will make the big difference.
"And the data says that if Republicans focus on economic issues and stay away from social ones like gay marriage, they can make serious inroads with millennials."
Some youth voting experts do think Republicans have a chance with the right message.
"Millennials have been let down by Democrats over the past seven years and are not looking for a repeat of the same old Washington, D.C., agenda. President Barack Obama gave millennials 'hope,' then stripped it away as he and his administration continued the same corrupt and secretive practices of the past," wrote author and campaign strategist Salvator La Matra in an April column for
The Blaze.
It is clear younger voters like change and are embracing outsider candidates.
In April, political newcomer Ben Carson led a
Harvard University Institute of Politics poll of Republican primary voters under 30,
The Washington Times reported. Carson, at 10 percent, headed off rivals Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (8 percent), and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who were both chosen by 7 percent of young Republicans in the poll.
Most telling, however, was a third of those younger voters said they were undecided on a primary choice, opening a window for candidates to win their interest, as Harvard reported "no front-runner" among the crowded GOP presidential primary field.
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