Let me preface this by saying I’m 28 – I’m in the “young person” category. Young people have no one to blame but themselves.
Let’s first agree that if 60-80% of young people voted, it wouldn’t matter what other Democrats thought. What the young voters wanted would overwhelmingly win, no matter what attempts there were or weren’t to hamper Bernie.
Bernie’s campaign had a clear goal and argument for victory – turn out young people and disaffected blue collar workers in numbers never seen before. This group would easily win against any candidate, Democrat or Republican.
But that didn’t happen. Bernie offered student loan forgiveness, free college, free weed, universal and free healthcare, and drastic climate actions. And that still wasn’t enough to turn out the youth vote. I don’t know what else he could possibly offer to get more young people voting. Don’t believe me? Take it from Bernie himself: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/powerup/2020/03/05/powerup-young-voters-are-turning-out-in-lower-numbers-than-bernie-sanders-expected/5e6018d6602ff10d49ac2c83/
“Have we been as successful as I would hope in bringing young people in?” Sanders remarked at a news conference in Burlington, Vt., after his disappointing Super Tuesday performance. “And the answer is no, we’re making some progress.” “It is not easy,” he added about mobilizing young voters.
Do you know what the takeaway is from this? “It doesn’t matter if you offer young people everything they want. They will won’t get out and vote.” Young people have no one else they can blame for this.
I want to see progressive progress, and I’m guessing you do too. We can’t do that by pointing to the DNC as the culprit if all of our issues. There were mistakes that we need to correct and we need to reengage with the public to see why messages didn’t land. Otherwise you’re just going to say in another 4 years that the DNC rigged it against progressives again, because you changed nothing but expected a different outcome.
