The strange takedown of David Hogg

David Hogg was castigated for suggesting the Dems need to listen to young men. Now the party is spending 8-figures on the issue.

Democrats have thrown an eye-watering $20 million at their “young men problem.” As they should. Their performance has been dismal — no surprise for the party of toxic masculinity, cancel culture, and “believe all women.”

Some notable data points from the 2024 presidential election, farmed from David Shor’s interview with Ezra Klein in March:

• 75-year-old white men supported Kamala Harris at a significantly higher rate than 20-year-old white men.

• Trump narrowly won nonwhite men.

• More than half of white men, white women and men of color younger than 26 supported Trump.

• Harris lost black male 18-year-olds.

• Voters aged 26 and under broke for Trump.

The DNC’s (apparently) $20 million problem: a voting base they took for granted is decisively alienated. But any conservative — and many Democrats — could have told you that, and why, for free.

David Hogg tried. On “Real Time with Bill Maher” several weeks back, Hogg, a Parkland shooting survivor and already a DNC vice chair at age 25, called out his party for leaving his kind behind:

Maher: What’s going on there with you and the DNC?

Hogg: Well look, I’m not here to defend the indefensible. The fact of the matter is, last election cycle we lost vote share with every single demographic except predominantly the older people and people with PhDs. That is a major problem…

A lot of younger men, I think, agree with what Democrats are saying… and right now, what I think happened last election, is young men — they would rather vote for somebody who, even if they don’t completely agree with, they don’t feel judged by, than somebody who they do agree with that they feel like they have to walk on eggshells around constantly because they’re going to be judged or ostracized or ex-communicated.

What’s interesting about this moment is it feels like the two parties, in some senses, have flipped, where Republicans used to be the judgmental assholes in many ways. Many Democrats, despite I would say for most of us coming from the right place and wanting to do the right thing, we’ve created a culture where we say, well, if you say the wrong thing you’re excommunicated, and that’s just not how human beings work.

Nobody’s perfect, but ultimately what we have to do here is figure out how to bring people back in and work towards the bigger goal of advancing the future of this country and helping young people especially get by so that they’re able to focus on their lives and getting with a young woman and stuff instead of how are they going to pay their rent, or how are they going to work their two jobs. Young people should be able to focus on what young people should be focused on, which is how to get laid and how to go out and have fun. (I encourage you to watch the whole clip, which was reposted to X here.)

Free input from a real life 25-year-old male Democrat! And yet, the response from the left: he is “blue MAGA," "an entitled incel," a “misogynistic asshole” and an “offensive white guy." Complete mystery why they’re losing young men. Also worth noting, this is yet another example of how the in-group contrarian draws more vitriol than the out-group critic.

I wrote about this in my New York Post column today, which I hope you will read here: “Democrats don’t need to spend $20 million to study why men abandoned the party — just stop trashing them.”

Shortly after the interview drew all shades of progressive vitriol, the Dems called for a vote to void Hogg’s position as vice chair. Coincidence? Hogg thinks not. You can make your mind up for yourself (Note: Hogg has also taken aim at “ineffective” incumbent Democrats, god forbid).

The Democratic Party is great at throwing money at problems (and receiving, I kid you not, a $20 million report that suggested they advertise more on video games and drop the “moralizing tone” towards men). But they’re consistently allergic to grassroots feedback (election-saving feedback like, say, most voters think Joe Biden is too old to run again, or Kamala never even made it to Iowa in 2020).

A multi-million dollar report that analyzes “the syntax, language and content that gains attention and virality in [young male] spaces” is far less valuable than a living, breathing young man who is eager to give constructive criticism from within. But the Dems’ ears remain closed.

This isn’t something that gives me pleasure to write. I don’t think my generation’s rightward swing in 2024 was due to a symbiosis between Gen Z and MAGA; I think many young people felt they had nowhere else to go. A healthy democracy needs compelling alternatives, and I will always root for anything that makes either party more viable and attractive to more Americans.

It’s my sincere hope that, in 2028, the Democrats can finally rise to the occasion and actually succeed in presenting a viable candidate that won’t lose elections that should be slam dunks, such as 2016 and 2024. It shouldn’t be that hard, but a good first step would be listening to what the next generation of Americans have to say.

Personal note: I shared the stage with David Hogg for a panel at Hofstra University last fall, just a couple months after his father had passed away and while my father was in the ICU (thankfully he is okay now). Even though that was the first and only time we met in person, David called and texted me multiple times to check in on a virtual stranger. Whatever you think of his politics, he showed me real kindness.