With podcasts and influencers, the Liberals fight to win back lost ground with younger voters

Trailing in the polls among the younger voters who could decide the next general election, the federal Liberals are scrambling to bring up their social media game and sell their recent budget to skeptical millennials and Gen Z.

After releasing a budget last month built around promises to help younger generations struggling with housing and the cost of living, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau went on an online media binge, sitting down for interviews with popular podcasts and YouTube channels about health care (The Gritty Nurse), economics and personal finance (The Plain Bagel) and even women's basketball (The Pick Up).

Trade Minister Mary Ng recently paid out of pocket for a drone she uses to record content when she's travelling on international trade missions. MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith hired a millennial filmmaker to produce his videos full-time. 

And Employment Minister Randy Boissonnault's Gen Z staffers have taken over his feeds. They've been leaning into social media trends that the minister claims have increased his reach by 300 per cent in the past month.

One poll suggests that what the Liberals have done since releasing the budget could be starting to move the needle for them. A new survey from Abacus Data says the Liberals have narrowed the gap to five points behind the Conservatives among younger voters — a substantial change from the 23-point gap reported in April. It's the second recent survey showing some movement in the Liberals' direction.

Dan Arnold, who conducted polling for the federal Liberals' last three election campaigns, said younger generations will make up 40 per cent of eligible voters in the next election.

"Right now, the Liberals are in the worst position they've been in with millennials and Gen Z voters," said Arnold, chief strategy officer at Pollara Strategic Insights and former director of research and advertising in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO). 

Millennials came out in record numbers to help catapult Trudeau into power in 2015. By 2019, said Arnold, "some were a little disillusioned by the party and felt maybe Trudeau didn't deliver on all of his promises, the image they had in their head of what he was going to do.

"And it's gotten worse since then, to the point where I've seen recent polling where the Liberals are polling at under 20 per cent among Gen Z and millennials. That's close to half the electorate. And if you are polling at 20 per cent or below with that group of voters there, it doesn't really matter what you do with boomers — you're not going to win an election campaign."

Conservatives, meanwhile, "are leading with millennials" and are "up among millennial women by almost 20 points over the Liberals," Arnold said. Younger Canadians want change, he added, and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has been reaching them on social media by talking about the things they care about most — housing and the cost of living.

Conservative strategist and president of Creative Currency Dennis Matthews said Poilievre has tapped into what younger voters are looking for on their social feeds, whether it's shorter clips or long-form documentaries.

"You've got Pierre Poilievre who's obviously running for prime minister, but he could also be a content creator online," he told CBC's The House.

Trudeau's office last week released a video explaining its proposed capital gains tax. The video has received 4.7 million views on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Trudeau's office doesn't talk about strategy publicly. A Liberal source with knowledge of the PMO's communication strategy said the public can expect to see more policy videos from Trudeau, along with lighter content — like his May 4 video with Canadian Star Wars actor Hayden Christensen — more appearances on podcasts and traditional media and more work with unpaid content creators, including influencers.