'Problem is reality': Theory for why young voters have dumped GOP fact-checked in NY Times

The youth are not being brainwashed — they just don't appreciate lies, a New York Times columnist told a slew of Republicans on Friday.

Opinion writer Jamelle Bouie issued a stern fact check to Montana senatorial candidate Tim Sheehy, Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) and X CEO Elon Musk over recent claims that college students are "indoctrinated" to believe in liberal values.

"What we have here, coming from these conservative and Republican voices, is the paranoid assertion that the nation’s institutions of higher education are engaged in a long-running effort to indoctrinate students and extinguish conservatism," wrote Bouie.

"The problem with this conspiracy theory, of course, is reality."

Bouie cites enrollment data that shows most American students study business, nursing and communications, and learn specific trades as opposed to more esoteric fields.

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The second problem Bouie has with the theory is the complete lack of evidence backing it up.

"Even those conservative organizations devoted to tracking and monitoring college professors struggle to find evidence of anything that looks like the Soviet-style brainwashing described by Musk and other MAGA conservatives," Bouie wrote.

Bouie provided readers an alternative theory as to why a Harvard Institute of Politics poll suggested most young people oppose the Republican Party’s views on abortion, climate change and gun regulation.

"A young woman looking ahead to her future doesn’t have to be brainwashed to decide that she wants the right to decide when and whether to have a child," Bouie wrote.

"A young man with memories of school shootings on the news and shooter drills at school doesn’t need to be indoctrinated to decide that he wants more gun control."

Ultimately Bouie concluded those lived experiences don't align with Republican messaging.

"If Republicans are underwater with young people, it’s because Republicans are not responsive to the interests of young people," he concluded.

"Not only do Republican politicians deny the reality of man-made climate change; they also actively spread lies and conspiracy theories meant to obscure the reality that climate change is responsible for some of the heightened intensity of weather events like Hurricanes Helene and Milton."