The election will be a ballot of many firsts and a last. Anthony Albanese is seeking to become the first Prime Minister since John Howard in 1998 to be re-elected to serve a second term. If successful, he will join Labor heroes Gough Whitlam (1974) and Bob Hawke (1984) as the only federal ALP leader to do so after taking the party out of opposition and into office.

Barring a miracle, or, for some, a catastrophe, Albo is our last Boomer PM. Henceforth, any change to the occupant of the Lodge won’t be a matter of ‘OK Boomer’ but rather ‘Outta our way, ok’. Should Peter Dutton triumph against the odds, he would be our second Gen X PM, after Scott Morrison. It is possible that the Prime Minister to succeed Albanese, should he win the election and choose to vacate, will skip a generation to the Gen Y Millennials.

We are witnessing a generational takeover. The election will be the first where Gen Z and Millennials outnumber Boomers in every state and territory. This demographic earthquake is shattering the old way of doing politics: changing who we elect, and how parties campaign.

Then there is the so-called ‘Trump bump’. Whereas incumbents of the left and right have been turfed from office in the years after Covid on account of inflation and the global cost-of-living crisis, in 2025 incumbents living in Trump world are reaping political dividends.

Australians don’t much like the Donald and Trump is particularly toxic with younger voters. As an Australia-first John Curtin Research Centre study of voters aged 18-44 shows, young Australians loathe the idea of a Down Under Donald. Only 12% say Australia would ‘definitely benefit’, and 11% say ‘probably’, a view shared by most young Liberal voters.

Our survey reveals something more unsettling. Young Australians don’t want a Trump, but they are angry with an establishment they associate with a rigged economic system. Overseas, they have flocked to anti-establishment right-wingers, from Trump to Argentina’s Javier Milei. In Europe, hard-right populists are winning over young voters who feel betrayed by the mainstream, from the Netherlands to left-wing strongholds like Sweden. Conversely, left-wing populism briefly surged in support of Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn.

There is no Australian exceptionalism. Young voter cohorts have known little beyond economic flux, uncertainty, and growing inequality since entering the workforce. Buffeted by the global financial crisis of 2008-09, enduring a decade of anaemic economic growth, stagnant wages, and a housing crisis, all made worse by COVID-19, young Australians feel abandoned by establishment parties. Among young men in their mid-to-late 20s, the trend is particularly acute and dangerous. They are attracted to a radical-right narrative that frames mainstream politics as corrupt, incompetent, and indifferent.

Reflecting other polling, Labor comfortably leads 60.5% to 39.5% on a 2PP basis, and the Greens picking up 1 in every 5 young voters and perhaps surprisingly nearly 1 in 10 for One Nation. Anthony Albanese fares relatively well among young voters, but for Peter Dutton the feedback from young voters is ominous. Our survey reveals he is far less trusted than Albanese, scores lower than US right-wing podcaster Joe Rogan, and ranks just above Trump. The only two figures who receive net positive trust scores are former centre-left politicians Barack Obama and Jacinda Ardern. No serving politician in Australia has a net positive trust rating from voters aged 18-44. Yet danger looms for Labor: the Greens’ Max Chandler-Mather and Adam Bandt are the most trusted serving politicians among young voters.

Anti-establishment politics transcends traditional left and right. Young voters who scored the highest on the populist scale were the least likely to support major parties. Instead, they gravitated toward minor parties and independents, including the Greens on the left (26%) and One Nation (13%) to the right. They are not straightforwardly right-wing or left-wing, conservative or progressive. They exhibit progressive views on social issues like gender roles but express grave scepticism towards immigration. However, the latter view isn’t informed by racism. It’s one thing to support immigration in principle, but when they see unchecked population growth smashing housing affordability and wages, it’s another story.

These young voters aren’t primarily animated by “wokeism” or culture wars; their grievances are material – housing, jobs, and living standards. The cost of living is the top concern for young Australians, with 83% ranking it among their top three issues, and 50% deeming it the most important issue. Housing affordability follows closely behind, with 48% of young voters identifying it as a top concern. Health, climate change, and even crime, are secondary concerns, but they are still significant for a large portion of the young electorate. Crucially, Gen Y and Z voters have little confidence in governments acting on their concerns.

Win or lose, our survey is a wake-up call all parties must heed. It’s not that young voters are embracing xenophobia or reactionary politics. But as economic insecurity and inequality grow, they will take a chance on anyone who promises to smash the system. Young people’s anger won’t be soothed with progressive platitudes or more of the same mainstream conservatism, nor Trumpism-lite. The anti-establishment mood isn’t a passing phase.

The biggest lesson is for the mainstream left. If it fails to deliver material change, the right will exploit voter frustration, as will the Greens. The ALP was born out of and sustained by working-class grievance with the establishment and righting injustice. It must channel this sentiment today, or young Australians will seek answers elsewhere. That future, whatever short-term Trump bump, is one where young voters look left, right, and anywhere else.