News coverage this election cycle has focused heavily on the Gen Z vote, and for good reason. Besides being the most diverse generation in American history, Generation Z—born between the mid 1990s and the early 2010s—has grown up during a turbulent time in the U.S., from the rise of school shootings to the COVID-19 pandemic to the first (and soon to be second) Trump presidency and legislative attacks on reproductive freedom.
Many Gen Z members now in their twenties feel called to activism, from students in Florida protesting book bans to young people working to help their peers access medication abortion. Ms. Studios’ new podcast The Z Factor, hosted by Harvard senior Anoushka Chander, interviews Gen Z voters, activists and lawmakers from across the country about the issues affecting young people in America today and how Gen Zers are stepping up to fight for a brighter future.
In The Z Factor’s third episode, Chander interviewed 21-year-old Olivia Julianna, who has advocated for abortion in her home state of Texas. When she was 19, Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz—who just withdrew as Trump’s pick for attorney general amid allegations that he paid a 17-year-old girl for sex—attempted to humiliate her by claiming that overweight and unattractive women don’t need to worry about unplanned pregnancies and abortions. During a speech in Tampa, Fla., in 2022, he said, “Why is it that the women with the least likelihood of getting pregnant are the ones most worried about having abortions? Nobody wants to impregnate you if you look like a thumb.”
Since then, Julianna has raised more than $700,000 for abortion funds through the organization Gen Z for Change, where she serves as a political strategist.
On The Z Factor, she and Chander delved into the unique worries of young women in America and Julianna’s own advocacy work.
Reproductive Freedom and Healthcare
“They’re mad, and they are scared and they’re motivated,” Julianna said, speaking about young women who voted in the Nov. 5 election.
According to Julianna, Gen Z women are concerned about the fate of reproductive rights in this country, as well as other issues like affordability and cost of living, which have been at the front of many Gen Z voters’ minds as they graduate from high school, college and enter independent adulthood.
In her interview with Chander, Julianna suggested that reproductive rights and economic welfare are equally important issues for young women: “I think that a lot of young women sometimes can feel very dejected from politics because they feel like the only time people are talking to them is when they’re talking to them about abortion, and they’re not talking to them about the other long-term policy issues that have to do with their lives that they’re coming into.”
Healthcare is another big concern for Gen Z women, who worry about losing their access to healthcare from the Affordable Care Act, Julianna explained. Under current laws, young people in their early twenties are also set to lose their access to their parent’s healthcare plan once they turn 26, a rising concern among other rising costs while experts warn that the economy will worsen under Trump.
Social Media Activism and Reaching Out to Young People
Julianna didn’t plan on being a Gen Z activist. “You know, this all happened by accident,” she said, explaining how she began posting videos on TikTok in the summer of 2020 before the election that she was one week too young to vote in.
She grew up in a “little farmhouse” in Needville, Texas, with plans of staying in her hometown and becoming an English teacher at her high school. But her dream was always to be involved with politics.
“I understood the moment that we were in and I really wanted other young people to understand it too,” Julianna said. Besides taking on Gaetz and raising hundreds of thousands of dollars to help people access abortion, she spoke at the 2024 Democratic National Convention and gave interviews supporting Kamala Harris’ candidacy.
However, being a young woman with a social media following comes with its fair share of online hate. “I feel special and privileged that I get to represent young women. I get to represent young Latino women, queer women, Texans,” she told Chander. “But it has been vicious. The reactions that I get on a daily basis, especially after the DNC, are just atrocious and I really wish that we could create a better ecosystem and a more supportive ecosystem for young women in politics, so that they know that this kind of stuff isn’t okay but also that we’re calling it out when we see it.”
Young Men and Far-Right Misinformation
Since the election and Trump’s win, online discourse has focused on the role of young men voters in the election’s outcome and how social media misinformation can target young people. However, Julianna doesn’t believe it’s the misinformation tricking young voters, but rather when false information comes from a social media influencer who might seem like a credible source.
“I think that when it comes to looking at news sources or analyzing information that young people actually do a really good job at filtering out what is true and what isn’t true if they’re looking at news source,” Julianna said.
Misinformation mostly comes “when you have someone who is talking directly to the camera saying this thing happened without any substance behind it.” She added that she thinks the misinformation spiral is especially a problem for young men, “who are consuming content from streamers and people who are making video game content, sports, content, people like Adin Ross, like Sneako.”
A lot of post-election analysis has pointed to growing a gender gap in the U.S. between men and women of all ages but especially Gen Z. At the same time, as the social media generation, Julianna believes that social media can be “extremely effective in disseminating ideas” and promoting accurate information. “People need to understand that just because someone is saying something to you does not mean it’s true and if something sounds wrong it probably is wrong.”
Texas and Reproductive Rights
Even before the Dobbs decision in 2022, Texas has been home to some of the harshest abortion laws in the country. Currently, there is a total abortion ban in Texas, which led in part to the deaths of Josseli Barnica and 19-year-old Navaeh Crain, who both died when doctors were not able to treat their miscarriages under the state’s draconian limits on reproductive care.
Julianna explained that even for women who have the resources to travel out of Texas, obtaining abortion care can still be near-impossible due to the state’s bounty law that incentivizes citizens with money if they succeed in suing anyone who has helped a person get an illegal abortion. The bill, which allows private citizens to file civil lawsuits against anyone who “aids or abets” an abortion, means that “it is practically impossible to get abortion care in the state of Texas,” said Julianna.
After reminding listeners about Amanda Zurawski and Kate Cox, who both spoke at the DNC about their experiences suffering pregnancy complications and being denied life-saving reproductive care, Julianna said she expects Texas Republicans to try to pass a statewide “abortion trafficking” law, which would criminalize anyone who helps a minor leave the state to obtain an abortion. Cities and local governments in Texas have already passed traffic ordinances prohibiting people from using specific roads and highways to travel for abortion care.
“At this point this isn’t a policy opinion or a policy difference,” Julianna said. “These are laws that have gone way too far, that are criminalizing women, criminalizing their bodies.”
Unlike in other Republican-led states like Arizona, which voted this month to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution, Texas does not allow citizen-led ballot initiatives. Activists in Texas are forced to rely on the federal government to pass bills like Roe v. Wade codifying abortion rights, which is yet another reason why Trump’s win was devastating to Texas reproductive rights advocates.
Hopes for Gen Z’s Political Future
Looking ahead to the future of our generation, Julianna is hoping to finally see some “legitimate institutional inclusion of young people.”
Given the level of media attention on young voters this election cycle, Julianna would like to see a White House youth policy council centering Gen Z voices and young people being included in congressional hearings. Growing up in a Mexican American family who has lived in Texas for generations, she understands the importance of community—”I think that’s why I have such a tight knit circle that I keep close because I know that at the drop of a hat anything can happen and I think we need to have each other’s backs.”
When it comes to the broader community of politically engaged young people in this country, she hopes that Gen Z “will have a seat at the table in a way that I don’t think that our generation really has had up until this point.”
New episodes of The Z Factor: Gen Z’s Voice and Vote podcast drop on Mondays.
