Fascinating data from Pew Research about the voting patterns of different age cohorts.
Compared with the electorate overall, Americans who came of age during the presidencies of Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson offered more support for Mitt Romney in 2012, and more support for John McCain in 2008. (For reference, the Kennedy-Johnson era 18-year-olds were ages 62-69 during the 2012 election.)
In some earlier elections that we tracked, likely voters from that cohort leaned somewhat more Democratic. But in every election since 2000, those who came of age under Kennedy and Johnson have either voted more Republican or about the same as the rest of the country.
As we remember JFK today, I encourage you to listen to some of the incredible audio that’s available on the website of the JFK Presidential Library and Museum. I particularly like this piece of audio from opening day of baseball season in 1961. In it, a WGN sportscaster talks to the president and vice president.
