In today’s politically divisive environment, many young voters are encouraged to participate in the American two-party system.

According to the Pew Research Center, nearly 37 percent of eligible voters in the upcoming 2020 presidential election will be members of the millennial generation and Generation Z (born after 1996).

What does this mean exactly? In 2016, according to Tufts University and the Brookings Institution, 55 percent of young voters preferred the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, while 37 percent backed the eventual winner, Republican Donald Trump.

As younger voters begin to take over a larger margin of the voting bloc, and there is an increased push by both Democratic and Republican strategists to capitalize on this shift, there could be a potential for a major power change in the next two election cycles. This threatens to undermine our constitutional republic.

The intent of the Founders was not to give absolute power to one party. To the contrary, our republic works best when we have multiple parties providing ideas, debates and compromise proposals for all citizens. Do not mistake this opinion as a call to action to mitigate or undermine the will of the next generation of voters.

On the contrary, this call is to empower the next generation of voters to seek out independent ideas. A generation of intellectually enslaved young minds shall lead to tyranny. A generation of young people who do not have an ability to hear out differences of thought and opinion will lead to stagnation of ideas.

The two-party system of politics has divided our citizenry, as foreshadowed by our first president, George Washington, in his 1796 farewell address. The death of a nation comes from a lack of moderate thinking. Extremism in any form is a threat to a people. Millennials and Generation Z are the key to the nation’s survival.

Anthony Suarez

Eliot