When a Young Republicans group gathered in Houston earlier this month to debate election strategy, top of the agenda was not how to battle Hillary Clinton – but whether they should support their own party’s candidate.

After an impassioned discussion, two-thirds of the 40-odd people at the Rice University College Republicans meeting voted not to back Donald Trump, joining other conservative college groups around the country in refusing to endorse the GOP presidential nominee.

Even in reliably red Texas, even for a generation eager for a candidate who disrupts and discomfits the ossified Washington establishment, Trump is a hard sell.

“Item No 1 on the list was how do we support a racist, how do we support someone who says horrible things about people, when that’s just not what we believe?” said Jake Blumencranz, the group’s president.

Leading up to the general election, ambivalence towards Trump from many millennial Republicans is compounding the long-term erosion of support for the party among young and middle-aged people.

A Pew analysis found that in 1992, 61% of Republican voters were younger than 50. Today, that number has declined to 41%, while only 13% of 18- to 29-year-olds favour the GOP. Compare that with 21% in 1992, when Democrats lagged Republicans in that age bracket.

How do we support a racist? How do we support someone who says horrible things about people? Jake Blumencranz

It should have been an unalloyed thrill for Blumencranz, a 20-year-old from New York, to take charge in an election year. Instead, he said, “it’s been very difficult. It’s made my job almost impossible as a college Republican in a leadership role. When I started, Trump was not the nominee yet and it was kind of frightening knowing that I would become president as Trump would be the nominee. Will I have to support him? Will I have to rally behind him? Then I thought about the fact that I might have to resign if my club chose to do that, because I just don’t think I can morally do that myself.”

Now, in the first presidential election where he can cast a ballot, he is pondering whether to go for the Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson, or not vote for a presidential candidate at all.

Jake Blumencranz on Trump: ‘Will I have to support him? Will I have to rally behind him?’ Photograph: Tom Dart/The Guardian

Juliette Turner, an 18-year-old student and author from north Texas, stumped for Trump at the contentious meeting. Though not blind to his flaws, she believes a President Trump would install conservatives in the supreme court, a vital issue for her, and that history shows division spells disaster.

“The Democrats have won for the past two election cycles. I believe that’s because they have rallied around their candidate no matter the cost, and what I’ve seen the Republican party do, much to our detriment, we have this mentality of going to the grave with our ideals,” she said.

“I was appalled when Ted Cruz did not speak Trump’s name at all in his speech at the Republican national convention. Compare that to what Bernie Sanders did – I’m pretty sure there was just as much animosity between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton as between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.”

Dogmatic inflexibility does not sit well with a generation of GOP sympathisers that, Blumencranz said, tend to describe themselves as fiscally conservative but socially liberal. While millennials are often characterised as optimistic, they face economic challenges that could make them less prosperous than their parents.

“A lot of Republicans are starting to brace for social, kind of, liberalism,” said Elizabeth Haynie, a 20-year-old student in Austin, Texas. “I can’t name a single young Republican I know who doesn’t support gay rights at this point ... but of course I am still for a limited government, basing your principles on the constitution, states’ rights. I’m more for that than for Washington DC trying to create a utopian society for me.”

Elizabeth Haynie: ‘A lot of Republicans are starting to brace for social, kind of, liberalism.’ Photograph: Courtesy of Elizabeth Haynie

Haynie believes there is “absolutely” a split in voting patterns between young Texas Republicans with and without a college degree.

“I think it’s just a misunderstanding of Republican ideals. Once we get back to understanding what the party stands for and not just kind of looking at the very bombastic messaging, I think more young people will like the Republican party.”

John Baucum, the chairman of the Texas Young Republican Federation, meanwhile expressed concern that on both sides of the political spectrum, “young people are just fed up with the status quo, they’re fed up with the inequities of the system”.

“My personal opinion – I think the younger generation is straining more in the Libertarian direction, sort of live and let live,” the 32-year-old business manager said.

Young people are just fed up with the status quo, they’re fed up with the inequities of the system John Baucum

John Lovell voted for Mitt Romney in 2012 and intends to support down-ballot Republicans, but he has doubts about the characters of Trump and Clinton.

“I can’t pull the lever for Donald Trump, it’s not in me,” said the 29-year-old structural engineer from Houston, who will vote for Johnson. “I think he has the mindset of a small government, kind of ‘leave me alone, let me do what I wanna do’ kind of thing,” he said.

Rudy Fonseca: ‘If we win, I’m very confident that Trump will surround himself with very intelligent people that will unify the party.’ Photograph: Tom Dart/The Guardian

Rudy Fonseca, a 20-year-old student at the University of Houston, was a Cruz supporter in the nomination race but is now backing Trump. “As a young conservative, I think it’s a good thing if you rattle up the establishment,” he said. “As a millennial, I think where we differ, most of us differ, is that we tend to be maybe open minded. I think the older crowd that are Republicans and conservatives, they’re not as willing to change their mindsets.”



He concedes that Trump’s candidacy has prompted “division now – but I think we will unify as we get even closer to the election. If we win, I’m very confident that Trump will surround himself with very intelligent people that will unify the party.”

If Trump loses? Fonseca thinks defeat could spark the downfall of establishment figures and perhaps inspire a new movement that energises young people – a sort of Sanders-style “political revolution” in the service of conservative, rather than socialist, values. “I think a reboot would be good because we’d see them leave Congress, hopefully,” he said.



Haynie agrees. “I think that it would actually be a great thing if Trump loses because I know that so many young people I know are disenfranchised with the Republican party. Two people have come up to me this weekend and were like, ‘If John Kasich was going to be the president, I would be a Republican, but I can’t because Trump is the face of the party.’”

“Republicans do need to branch out more and try to reach minority groups and millennials,” said John Douglas, an 18-year-old student from the Houston area. “I think most Republicans just think, ‘They’re already not going to vote for me, so I’m not going to try,’ and that’s a bad way of thinking.”

Jon Melendez lives in Laredo, Texas, on the border with Mexico, where discontent with Trump is especially pronounced given his stance on immigration. “After every election, some of the wise men in the Republican party say, ‘Oh yeah, we need to go after this group of people, after younger people,’” he said.

“But then Republican primaries kick in and then all sanity is lost. It’s like, one candidate says, ‘I’m going to build a 5ft wall! A 10ft wall! A 15ft wall!’ And the candidate who says he’s going to build the largest wall is going to win. A lot of pandering – but the party’s pandering to a demographic that really isn’t growing.”

The 30-year-old MBA student plans to vote Libertarian and fears for the future of the GOP. “I kind of just see it being maybe more of a regional party, maybe winning Senate seats and congressional seats in the future but in terms of ever capturing the presidency again, I’m not sure it’s going to happen,” he said.