What Issues Do Gen Z Conservatives Care About Most? I Asked AmFest
James West attended Turning Point USA’s (TPUSA) 2025 AmericaFest over the weekend with his four young-adult grandsons. He told me that when he was young, politics and religion were topics to avoid in polite conversation. “I’m glad to see the day now where people are open about that, can talk freely about that.”
Thirty-one thousand attendees, from across all 50 states and 25 countries, gathered at the Phoenix Convention Center over the weekend to do just that. The unprecedented attendee turnout leaped from around 20,000 in 2024 in the wake of TPUSA founder Charlie Kirk’s assassination at Utah Valley University in September.
Lydia Leinbach, a master’s student at Montana State University, told me she had become discouraged and less politically engaged after President Trump lost his presidential bid in 2020, but that Kirk’s assassination refueled her passion for political engagement. “As conservatives, we have to be involved. We can’t just back out and say, ‘Ok, it is what it is.’”
Mrs. Erika Kirk opened the event on Thursday afternoon, challenging attendees to lean into the discomfort when disagreements, both on and off the stage, arose. While the squabbles brewing in the conservative movement were the subject of formal and informal debate, many young conservatives who shared their political priorities with me kept out of the minutiae. Instead, themes of affordability, immigration, and the sanctity of life emerged as top-of-mind for young voters.
Following AmFest, TPUSA released polling data revealing nearly 64 percent of attendees believe Republicans’ main priority right now should be winning the midterms. When asked about the biggest threats facing the country, more than 30,000 attendees pointed to radical Islam, while socialism and Marxism, mass immigration, and the economy and affordability were also top concerns.
Affordability and Immigration
Leinbach named fighting illegal immigration and bringing down housing costs as her top political priorities — and she was not alone. Both stood out as top issues for young conservatives.
Grant May, who works with the Standing for Freedom Center at Liberty University, told me he sees immigration and the economy, particularly housing costs, as the top concerns of young voters, who have a “growing feeling that the American Dream is unattainable to the next generation.”
The cost of housing is “something the right has not traditionally been good on,” May noted. “The left is coming up with solutions that are bad. We need to come up with good solutions.”
As The Federalist’s Eddie Scarry recently wrote, President Trump’s suggestion that cost-of-living concerns are just a “con job” by Democrats doesn’t align with the experiences of young conservatives on the ground.
Karlee VanAntwerp, a student at Michigan State University who calls herself a moderate conservative, told me she believes high costs are causing “a lot of younger people to lose hope about their future, and owning a home and raising a family.”
“We’re in office now, so we can’t just blame the liberals,” VanAntwerp added, though she acknowledged Trump’s relatively recent transition back into office.
From the main stage, Michael Alfonso, a Gen Z congressional candidate from Wisconsin, also marked “the affordability crisis” as one of the biggest challenges facing young people today. “The average first-time home buyer is 40 years old. That can’t happen in the United States,” he said from the stage.
Many young conservatives at AmericaFest also highlighted immigration as a top political priority. May told me he believes immigration will continue as a winning issue for conservatives as it has been for President Trump. “The more you lean into it, the better,” May said.
“I’m really happy with what President Trump is doing in deporting illegal immigrants. If you come here legally, that’s awesome, welcome. But illegal immigrants have to go back,” Leinbach said.
While conservatives remain unified on illegal immigration, AmFest showcased continued conservative critiques of the H-1B visa program.
“Not only is illegal immigration driving down wages, but we have some legal immigration doing it,” Alfonso said. His campaign platform argues that “mass immigration, including programs like H-1B, hurts American workers and undercuts wages.”
Jack Harvey, a student leader for Turning Point USA at East Tennessee State University, echoed this concern. He reflected on possible 2028 Republican candidates’ positions on H-1B visas. “If you’re not willing to put American workers first … how can you be the next president of the United States?”
What About Abortion?
Several young conservatives shared that pro-life values ranked near the top of their priorities, political expediency notwithstanding.
“You fight for what’s right, no matter if it’s going to help you or … hurt you. I think pro-life is one of those situations,” college student George Merritt told me.
Liberty Harris of South Carolina argued that ending abortion is a hinge on which all other freedoms rest. “We no longer live in a free country if we’re killing the next generation,” she said.
Unifying the Movement
Attendees reflected on what it might take to unite a bickering conservative movement, particularly ahead of midterm elections.
“We should have been able to unite around the fact that they killed Charlie Kirk and that a large segment of the left space cheered it on,” May told me. He referenced, for example, the violent texts from Virginia Attorney General-elect Jay Jones, who fantasized about killing his political opponent and wished death on his opponent’s children.
“If that’s not the existential threat to the right in America, I don’t know what is,” May said. “Our problem is not ourselves. Our problem is actually the left and their violence and their tolerance of violent rhetoric. And so we should be able to unite around opposing that and presenting an alternative vision forward.”
Charlie Kirk’s Legacy
“I think we really [have] to bring back faith as one of the … first pillars in our nation,” AmFest attendee and West’s grandson Andrew Fales noted. “That’s what I really like about Charlie Kirk. He was very firm on that.”
“I want to make a difference. I want to serve this country like Charlie Kirk served our movement and our people,” University of South Florida, St. Petersburg freshman Nickolas Peter Correia Sousa Perisse told me.
Kirk “definitely influenced me to live out my faith and beliefs in a bolder way,” VanAntwerp said, “and to open myself up to different ideas and be willing to debate, because you can’t just assume that you’re right about everything.”
TPUSA has experienced rapid growth since Kirk’s assassination on Sept. 10. Mrs. Erika Kirk reported that, over the months since, TPUSA has received more than 140,000 “get involved” requests. As of Thursday, the organization boasted 4,514 college and high school chapters, with about 50 more added daily.
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