Millennials Know Their Facts Better Than Older Americans

“Millennials don’t know less than our parents’ generation, we just know enough to appreciate how much we don’t know,” writes Eric Levitz in New York magazine. Drawing on a recent PRRI/The Atlantic survey finding that nearly half (49 percent) of Americans under 30 do not believe they know enough about the issues to vote, Levitz argues that this is a reflection of millennials’ appreciation for how much they do not know. Levitz also cites a report from the Pew Research Center finding that 18-to 29-year-olds are actually better at separating fact from fiction than Americans over the age of 50. “So, if there are any self-deprecating, politically disengaged millennials out there — who are, for whatever reason, reading an article about millennial political disengagement — rest assured: If Donald Trump is well-informed enough to be president, you definitely ‘know enough about the issues’ to vote this November,” Levitz concludes.

Georgia Gubernatorial Candidate Concerned About Georgians Using Their Right to Vote

In audio from a ticketed campaign event obtained by Rolling Stone, Georgia gubernatorial candidate Brian Kemp expressed concern about his opponent’s voter turnout operation, “especially if everybody uses and exercises their right to vote.” Kemp, a Republican and the current Georgia secretary of state, has been engaged in a fierce electoral battle against his Democratic opponent, Stacey Abrams. On the campaign trail, Abrams has accused Kemp of using voter suppression tactics against minority and African-American voters. Earlier this month, Kemp was sued by a coalition of civil rights groups over a 2017 voting law that required more than 50,000 people to take additional steps to verify their identities in order to vote. This week, the Georgia NAACP filed complaints with state election officials, claiming that votes for Abrams were mistakenly showing up as votes for Kemp on some voting machines, as reported by USA Today. According to recent PRRI polling, 56 percent of Democrats say that eligible voters being denied the right to vote is a major problem in our current election system. Only 19 percent of Republicans agree that this is a major issue. White Americans are far less likely than black and Hispanic Americans to express concerns about eligible voters being denied the right to vote. Only 27 percent of white Americans say this is a serious issue, compared to 60 percent of Hispanic and 62 percent of black Americans.

“Proud to be Georgian:” Georgia Gubernatorial Nominee Speaks on Her Participation in 1992 Flag Burning Protest

This week, The New York Times reported on Georgia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams’s participation in a 1992 protest against the former Georgia state flag, which incorporated half of the Confederate flag. Participants in the 1992 protest burned the state flag on the steps of Georgia’s capital in a reportedly unplanned moment of the demonstration. Abrams has defended her participation in the protest, as reported by The Washington Post. In Tuesday’s gubernatorial debate against Republican opponent Brian Kemp, Abrams said she was “proud of Georgia and proud to be a Georgian,” but “deeply disturbed” by what the Confederate symbol stood for. She described the protest as “an action of peaceful protest” that reflected many people’s perspectives. Per PRRI data from 2017, 58 percent of Americans see the Confederate flag more as a symbol of Southern pride than as a symbol of racism, while 30 percent of Americans see the Confederate flag as a symbol of racism. Views of Confederate monuments vary starkly by race and ethnicity. More than two-thirds (68 percent) of white Americans and a majority (54 percent) of Hispanic Americans agree that Confederate monuments are symbols of Southern pride, compared to only 29 percent of black Americans.

#MeToo Brought Down 201 Powerful Men; Nearly Half of Their Replacements Are Women.

A year after the explosion of the #MeToo movement, The New York Times released an interactive outlining the fates of various powerful men who were brought down by allegations of sexual harassment and assault. The interactive, put together by seven collaborators, spells out the specific accusations faced by more than 200 men who lost their jobs after they were publicly accused of sexual harassment or assault, including Harvey Weinstein, Russell Simmons, Louis CK, Brett Ratner, and Tavis Smiley. Notably, The Times found that “nearly half of the men who have been replaced were succeeded by women.” According to PRRI polling, “By more than a two-to-one margin, Americans say that real experiences of sexual harassment or assault that are not reported or believed are a bigger problem in the U.S. than false accusations made about sexual harassment or assault (65 v percent. 26 percent).” More than seven in ten (72 percent) women, compared to 57 percent of men, say that real experiences of sexual harassment or assault that are not reported or believed are a bigger problem than false accusations.