Younger voters worried about coronavirus, pessimistic about the future: poll

Young voters are worried about the future of the U.S. as well as the coronavirus pandemic and are less likely to support President Trump compared to his Democratic rival Joe Biden, according to a new national poll.

The online NBC News/Quibi poll published Friday found that at least 4 in 10 voters under the age of 40 believe their children’s generation will be worse than theirs has been.

Forty-one percent of Generation Z voters — those between the ages of 18 and 23 — said they are confident their children’s generation will be worse than theirs has been, while 40 percent said it’d be better.

Among millennial voters, those between the ages of 24 and 39, nearly half — 49 percent — said they were not confident about the future, while 30 percent had a positive outlook.

The poll also found that about 70 percent of young voters worry that they or an immediate family member may contract COVID-19, with about a third of them saying they had already taken a test for the virus.

This comes as the U.S. on Thursday reported the highest daily increase in the number of coronavirus cases since mid-August, bringing the total number of cases in the country to more than 7.6 million and nearly 213,000 deaths.

Among Gen Z voters, 64 percent prefer Biden over Trump, compared to 50 percent of millennial voters, according to the NBC News/Quibi poll.

The results also indicated that only 6 in 10 millennial voters said they have a high interest in the November election, while fewer than half of Gen Z voters said they were invested in the outcome. 

Biden maintains a substantial lead over Trump in national polls after their first debate, with 57 percent of voters in a CNN-SSRS poll released Tuesday saying they support Biden compared to 41 percent for Trump.

The RealClearPolitics polling index shows Biden with an almost 10 point advantage over Trump nationally. 

When it comes to the Black Lives Matter movement and other social causes, younger voters are also likely to have positive perceptions.

The NBC News/Quibi poll reported that more than 60 percent of Gen Z voters, as well as half of millennials, have “positive impressions” of Black Lives Matter.

The poll included interviews with 250 millennial registered voters and another 250 Generation Z voters from Sept. 30 to Oct. 6. NBC reported results with an approximately 7 percentage point margin of error.