'I feel like I got duped': The young men turning on Trump

I will act with historic speed and strength and fix every single crisis facing our country. We have to do it. The fact that he was so personable and he was this entertainer, it felt good to have him in your corner. He's like, that's my guy. He's not like us, but... Because he's a billionaire, but, you know, he's willing to empathize with us. He's going to fight for us. Nick Aparicio and his young Republican friends felt a strong connection to the Trump they voted for in 2024. He engaged with young people in a way I don't think we've seen. How did he do that? Well, I mean... It's kind of a stupid thing, but podcasts. You have, like, comedic instincts. Like, when you said to Hillary, you'd be in jail. Like, that's great timing. Actually did do a lot to kind of humanize him, to, you know, kind of get him into our spaces and get him hearing about our issues. Well, I think the people like me. Oh, yeah, the people. Because we're leading now in all the polls. In the run-up to the election, Right-leaning podcast hosts rallied around Trump. Even if they didn't agree with you, they at least knew whoever that guy is, that's him. That's really him. We had the greatest economy in history when I was president. Oh yeah, my cousin got a boat. What a beautiful day. Now these young men don't feel connected to Trump, they feel tricked. I felt like I got duped. No new wars became the Iran war. You know, lowering prices became gas prices through the roof. It became the big beautiful bill instead of, you know, the doge cuts. So it's just been like, not only disappointment, but like... The wrong stuff and it makes me question why would I vote for a Republican associated with Trump. If Trump is starting to lose guys like this that's major because last election one of the big swings that helped solidify Trump's win was the way he energized young conservative men. According to exit polling in 2024 white Gen Z men picked Trump over Kamala Harris by a 14 point margin. But then, you got... Ice raids. But now those same podcasters who helped him get elected have also changed course. In real ways, you and me and millions of people like us are the reason this is happening right now. And I want to say I'm sorry for misleading people. You just really start to feel very disillusioned pretty quickly. Disillusioned in our leaders. I voted for none of this. He's doing the exact opposite of everything I voted for. UFC. Freedom 250. Scoffing at events like the UFC White House fight. Are you excited for the White House card? That looks really good. I know it's going to be very high security and high stress and weird to have a fight at the White House in the middle of a f***ing war. While others went further. The Republican Party needs to be burned to the ground. They need to lose. So leading up to the 2024 election, President Trump was really hyped up by conservative podcasters. Wall Street Journal reporter Neil Mehta tracked conservative podcast mentions of Trump through 70,000 hours of broadcasts. He says a drop-off started after the 2024 election. But what we didn't expect is that that drop-off continued far beyond the 2024 election. And since then, conservative podcasters have mentioned Trump's name now 70% less than they were back during the 2024 elections. Here in Binghamton, New York, where Nick is the president of the chapter of College Republicans, every trip to school is a pricey reminder of who he voted for. You see it piling up and it wouldn't be totally as bad if it appeared like Donald Trump cared. Like when he was questioned about rising housing prices, he said something along the lines of like, Oh, I want it to increase. I don't want to drive housing prices down. I want to drive housing prices up for people that own their homes. Like, okay, that's great for people who have a home. That's great for older Americans, but what about me? The awareness of issues facing young men has entered public discourse in a way that you just can't say that it was two years ago. Oh, really? To help us understand Nick's generation, we caught up with David Sasaki, who runs the Research and Policy Program at the American Institute for Boys and Men. Whether it's political leaders or podcasts, He sees something missing in many young men's lives. We see, statistically, there are way fewer teachers who are male in U.S. schools. That has gone down since the 1980s. I grew up with a single mother. I think, you know, a lot of people do. And so you grow up without these male mentors. When Gen Z men listen to these podcasts, I think that they feel that they are being spoken to, not just about. It's using language that they use. It's using cultural references and jokes that... You know that they relate to. I relate to a lot of it myself. Have we seen a bit of a sea change with terms of a lot of these these hosts? Now with the midterms approaching, what's happening? Are they actually backing away from the president? If you ask them that question, I don't think that they would tell you that they were pro-Trump or pro-MAGA going into that election. They just wanted something different and they felt like they didn't get something different in the end. Something different? That desire for authenticity is showing up in interesting places. In America, there are signs that young men are frustrated and fracturing from the Republican right. Here in New York City, the same 60,000 people who voted for Zoran Mamdani also voted for President Trump in the last election, which suggests this voting bloc is hungering for something more than just MAGA. They were up for grabs in 2024, they're certainly up for grabs again in 2026, and they likely will be in future elections too. I mean, I think that this is a demographic that is probably largely distrustful of institutions, feel like they don't see policies that are giving them the opportunities that they're looking for and want change. I think there might be an impression from some that a lot of these young men automatically default into the MAGA group. You're saying not necessarily so. What they found looking into the audience demographics is that only four out of ten listeners of these podcasts identified as Republican. So a minority of the young men listening to these podcasts that are thought of as the Manosphere or the MAGA podcasters actually identify themselves as Republican. One major difference between now and 2024, back then it was Trump what made him... feel different and stand out, that energized young men and brought them to vote, but as many of his promises have failed to materialize, those voters could stay home. And experts tell CNBC that could play a critical role in some of the closest races. Chatting with Xavier Englund and Marcus Kenianu, Nick's friends and members of Binghamton College Republicans, there's a long list of grievances. How do you guys feel when the Iran war started? That was like the end of the road for me, because I already by 2025, you know, I was a bit pessimistic, but I was still holding out. Like you had the Epstein file, like backtracked, which really was like a huge, like, whoa moment to me. When he talks about the trillions of, like you're laughing, right? He talked trillions of dollars coming into this country. How do you feel? Um, I think it's funny because he talks about this golden age and the gas prices are as high as they are under the Biden administration. Prices of everything have gone up. As frustration mounts, they say their loyalty shouldn't be taken for granted. We've grown up in this country that has gotten higher in social inequality, that has become further from what we've known, that has become harder to live the kind of lives that our parents and our grandparents lived. And I think that people in Gen Z are not just going to fall into this partisan divide that previous generations have. And while Trump energized the last campaign, even as they help out the local Republican candidate, Trump is making it harder. It's been one of our biggest problems as student organizers over the past few months is that we had trouble getting people engaged. We've had trouble getting people to the door. We've had trouble getting people making phone calls in these races. Back at home, Nick is waiting to be heard. The worst part about it is we haven't changed. We still want the same things. We're just waiting for someone to come and deliver them. We're getting close. Are you going to vote in the next midterms? I'm unsure. I, again, want to emphasize the point that young men should not be taken for granted by the Republicans. I don't want to go out and vote for a party that is under-delivered, but at the same time, I'm still contemplating my decision. You might, Nick, you might stay home. Right. I mean, People do all the time. It doesn't change. It's no different for me, despite my position, you know. I just think it's like, again, I don't want my vote to be taken for granted. I don't want people to think, oh yeah, he'll turn out, you know, every election we could do whatever. There has to be consequences for failing to deliver.