In an extremely close election race, young people could sway the outcome in favor of the former president Donald Trumpthe survey suggests.

With the election just days away, the polls are closer than ever, with 538’s tracker showing the VP Kamala Harris leads by 1.2 points, while each swing state is within 2 points. Meanwhile, the Cook Political Report released its final predictions on Friday, which revealed the election to be a disaster.

Amid what could be the closest election in 150 years, both candidates are making last-ditch attempts to appeal to their bases to get out the vote. For Trump, it’s mainly older and white working-class voters, as well as men. For Harris, it’s younger and college-educated voters, as well as black and Hispanic voters and women. But recent polls indicate that there is a group drifting to the right — and it could cost Harris the election.

According to a recent survey, young men are much more Republican than young women and are ready to support Trump.

Although there are not many surveys reporting results among young men and young women, an average of the last three New York TimesSiena College national polls conducted between September and October showed Trump leading Harris among young men, 58 percent to 37 percent, though Harris held an even larger lead among young women, 67 percent to 28 %.

Another poll, conducted by the Harvard Kennedy School of 2,002 18- to 29-year-olds in September, found a 10-point gender gap, with 38 percent of men backing Harris, compared to 28 percent of women and 49% of women. men support Harris, compared to 59% of women.

Recent polling by the Alliance for Black Equality, conducted between October 15 and 19, found that black Gen Z males were the most likely group of black voters to support Trump, with 35 percent of the demographic supporting him the former president. The survey surveyed nearly 1,500 respondents and had a margin of error of approximately +/- 2.6 percent.

Newsweek reached out to the Trump and Harris campaigns for comment via email.

“The youth vote could be decisive in a very close election,” said Jackson Katz, co-founder of the Young Men’s Research Initiative. Newsweek. “There is a huge gender gap among younger voters; young women overwhelmingly support Harris. And young men support it, but with much smaller percentages”.

For Katz, the appeal of Trump and his campaign to young people lies in his identity-based campaign strategy.

“The Trump campaign’s primary strategy with men — especially, but not exclusively, white men — is an identity-based appeal. They want to drive home the point that “real men vote Republican,” he said. “It’s not about the problems, per se. This is perhaps even more evident when it comes to young men. They hold liberal and progressive views on a range of issues — abortion rights, climate change, support for unions, etc. And yet, the Youngest Cohort appears to be moving to the right in terms of party identification and support for Trump. What explains this, I think, is that Trump and MAGA have made explicitly connecting with men and youth a critical part of the strategy.”

“Since Donald Trump emerged as a presidential candidate in 2016, the primary focus of the Trump campaign has been to frame it as a men’s movement and frame Democrats as the party of feminized women and men and was incredibly relentless,” he added.

Research has supported this theory. The nonprofit research group Blueprint, which focuses on men’s well-being, found that 50 percent of men say it describes Democrats well when they say they think masculinity is bad. And Ipsos found 68 percent of republicans and 6% of Democrats agree that “ Democratic Party it is hostile to masculine values”.

Frank Gonzalez, an associate professor of political science at the University of Arizona, agreed with Katz, saying Newsweek: “Trump represents this anti-PC ‘be proud to be male’ culture that’s finding a lot of traction online these days. Black and Latino men in particular have been somewhat susceptible to this because masculinity, strength, being able to provide for one’s family and the like are highly valued in these populations, for lack of a better term, machismo is a way of maintaining one’s self-esteem when one’s status and dignity are threatened, so Trump’s macho persona may appear. a beacon for black and brown youth seeking a source of dignity, respect and identity in today’s world.”

He continued: “Conservative figures like Charlie Kirk and Ben Shapiro have spent many years now building their campaign to attract young voters — especially male voters — to the right. There’s also a preponderance of influencers and podcasts right now that are, on the face of it, apolitical, but really seem to be pumping out extremely gendered ideas about society. I think of Joe Rogan, but also of Kill Tony show and the like.”

Both candidates have tried to appeal to younger voters throughout this election alternative media channels such as podcasts which are shared on YouTube. Trump appeared on The Joe Rogan ExperienceTHE The Shawn Ryan Showas well as Theo Von and Lex Fridman’s podcast. All four podcasts attract a largely young, male audience — a demographic Trump is leaning on for support.

Meanwhile, Harris refused to appear The Joe Rogan Experience. For Katz, this was a disappointing move in her campaign.

“I was hoping it would go further The Joe Rogan Experiencebecause I think it would have been a very powerful statement for young people,” he said.

“It would have been a statement to them that he sees them, cares about them and wants to do everything he can to help them. Because I think a lot of the narrative that’s come out in the last decade is that Democrats hate white men, or they don’t care about white men. They don’t care about the struggles of white men, especially white men, and I think that’s completely untrue.

According to Katz, to fix this, Democrats need to create a “permission structure” for men to vote for Harris.

“I think what the Democrats need to do is create a structure of permissions for men, including white men, to vote for Kamala Harris. The Republican right-wing media universe, and certainly the Trump campaign, has been relentlessly bashing and ridiculing men who vote for Democrats and So what we need to do to counter that is show men who are credible and reliable messengers with other men who say, ‘I’m voting for Kamala Harris and that’s fine,'” he said.

“If recognized ‘male’ figures support Harris, it gives young people a ‘permission structure’ to do the same. That’s why of Arnold Schwarzenegger Harris’ recent endorsement is significant.”

The actor and former Republican governor endorsed Harris this week.

“We must close the door on this chapter of American history and I know former President Trump will not do that,” Schwarzenegger wrote in a post on X. “He will divide, he will insult, he will find new ways. to be more un-American than it already is, and we the people will only get more anger.”

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung denied the endorsement, previously saying Newsweek: “Arnold Schwarzenegger thinks too well of himself if he actually thinks his endorsement will matter. It hasn’t been relevant for 15 years.”

Despite Schwarzenegger’s endorsement, Katz believes the Democratic Party “hasn’t done a very good job of articulating how their political agenda is much better for young people and male struggles than the Republican political agenda,” which could hurt them on election day.

Research by the Young Men’s Research Initiative shows that Republicans have surpassed Democrats in targeting young people nationally and in battleground states. In October, Republican-aligned groups outspent Democratic-aligned groups four to one on election advertising aimed at young people, according to research. And in PennsylvaniaDemocrats were outspent by 10.5 to 1 to target young people in October.

However, Katz suggests there is still hope for Harris if young women turn out to vote and young men stay home.

“We know that young women seem to be highly motivated to vote in this election, both because they support Kamala Harris and because of the importance of abortion rights on the ballot, but we don’t know, there could be far fewer young people. men going out to vote,” he said. “And I think part of the challenge in the Trump campaign was trying to get more young men to come out than they normally do, because they know they’re going to lose out very badly among women, and especially young women . “

Alvin Tillery, founder of the Alliance for Black Equality and co-founder of the 2040 Strategic Group, said Newsweek he thinks that if Harris is changing his message to highlight the risks of a Trump presidency, could regain the support of young people, especially young black men.

“Our polls show that when you expose young black people to details about Donald Trump’s agenda, they respond with significant shifts in support for Vice President VP Harris,” he said. “This tells me that what we’re seeing in the polls of young people is more failures by Democrats to message them directly about the issues they care about than anything about their cohort.”

Recent polls by the Alliance for Black Equality, conducted between Oct. 2 and 4, showed that Harris could increase his support among younger black voters by as much as 15 percent if he shifts his message to highlight the risks of a Trump presidency . Specifically, her campaign should focus on Trump’s plans to implement nationwide stop-and-frisk policies, his record of undermining federal civil rights and his endorsement of Project 2025 initiatives.

Meanwhile, the latest poll by the Alliance for Black Equality shows that between Oct. 4 and Oct. 19, Harris’ support among black Gen Z men rose from 59 percent to 69 percent. The poll showed an even bigger improvement for Harris’ support among black men ages 23 to 29, which skyrocketed from 49.9 percent to 62.2 percent over the same time period. Support among black men ages 18-22 went from 47.7 percent to 52.7 percent.