Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Republicans have only themselves to blame for younger voters’ growing openness to socialism after voters ages 30 and under shifted sharply to the left in last week’s midterm elections.
The term-limited governor criticized “corporatist Republicans” who steer government toward favored industries and companies, saying their policies have fueled young Americans’ disillusionment with capitalism and more favorable views of socialism. He made the remarks during an appearance on “The Sage Steele Show.”
“Young people have a very positive view of socialism compared to capitalism. The question is, why is that?” DeSantis said Wednesday, one day after Democrats captured both chambers of Congress by overwhelming margins.
“Some of it is the education in our universities. But I think a big part of that is, what they’re comparing is not free enterprise versus socialism. What they’re comparing is how government gets involved in business, and you have crony capitalism.”
“The best kind of indirect supporters of socialism are some of these corporatist Republicans who propagate these crony policies,” he added, arguing that such practices alienate younger voters.
DeSantis said a socialist candidate on the ballot would be an automatic rejection for a Republican like him. But he questioned whether the label still alarms “the broader electorate who aren’t as partisan.”
“If it’s cronyism versus socialism, there’s going to be enough people who are going to choose socialism,” he warned.
Tuesday’s results indicated that the “socialist” label did little to deter voters.
Republicans spent much of the election cycle linking vulnerable left-leaning Democrats to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist.
“House Republicans will make Zohran Mamdani famous in battleground races next November,” the National Republican Congressional Committee said in an October 2025 memo, according to Axios.
By Wednesday, DeSantis had described the election results as “close to an extinction-level event for Republicans in many parts of the country.”
In a post on X, he predicted that Republicans could remain out of control of the Senate until 2032.
The results appeared to validate his bleak assessment. Democrats won Republican-held Senate seats in Texas, Kansas, Iowa, Maine, North Carolina and South Carolina.
In Florida, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) won the governor’s mansion by just over one percentage point, defeating Democrat David Jolly to succeed DeSantis, who is barred from seeking another term.
DeSantis’ criticism of crony capitalism predates the Republican defeat. In September, he told the Heartland Institute that crony capitalism was “warmed over socialism.”
The electoral shift was most pronounced among the young voters at the center of his remarks. Voters under 30 supported Democratic House candidates by 66% to 31%, according to a preliminary estimate from Tufts University’s CIRCLE. That represented an increase from the Democrats’ 14-point advantage among the same age group in the 2024 House exit poll.