As the Democratic Party navigates how to fight back against President Donald Trump and the Republican Party with little meaningful power in Washington, D.C., some young Black Democrats are running for office hoping to shake things up in Congress and bring what they see as much-needed new blood to Capitol Hill.
After former Vice President Kamala Harris’ loss in the 2024 election against Trump and the Democrats losing their slim majority in the U.S. Senate, the party of FDR finds itself at a crossroads.
Pundits say Democrats, practically in political purgatory, are in great need of direction and clear messaging if they’re going to win back Congress in 2026 or the White House in 2028.
Young Black Democrats who spoke with theGrio say they are ready to bring a new vision and lived experiences to Congress and help their party win back voters’ trust.
“It’s important that we put people in who are going to have a fresh approach, new perspectives, innovative solutions because we are dealing with unprecedented times,” said Amanda Edwards, a candidate for Texas’ 18th Congressional District, which tragically saw two consecutive representatives die while in office in less than a year.
Longtime Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee died of pancreatic cancer in July 2024 at the age of 74. Several months later, her successor, Sylvester Turner, died of health complications at 70 after only two months in office.
Edwards, 43, and a crop of mostly young candidates are now vying to be elected to the congressional seat in a special election in November. The winner will join a historically and overwhelmingly white—and old—institution.
In addition to addressing the needs and concerns of the district’s residents, the candidates cite Trump’s actions as an impetus for stepping up to the plate and opposing what they say is the president’s dangerous agenda—an agenda Democrats and advocates say disproportionately impacts Black Americans.
Edwards, an attorney and former Houston City Council member, said President Trump “doesn’t believe in the rule of law” and has critically “dismantled so many of our basic rights.” She told theGrio, “The people are being played as pawns in a political game right now, which is improper and inappropriate and an abuse of power. We’ve got to respect people and their right to their very basic needs, and right now, a lot of that’s being threatened.”
The Black candidates who spoke with theGrio believe that turning to new, younger voices could be the Democrats’ best shot at changing the course for the party and moving it into the future.
“When it’s time to pass that baton forward, we’ve got to make sure we do it,” said Edwards.
While generational representation in Congress is gradually skewing younger and away from the Baby Boomer generation, the average age in Congress remains over 61, according to Pew Research data.
“There are a lot of issues that we are dealing with that, frankly, young people are slightly more connected to, just because we’ve experienced it more,” said Zoe Cadore, who is also running for Texas’ 18th Congressional District.
Cadore, a 35-year-old Capitol Hill lobbyist, and former congressional staffer, told theGrio that her generation, millennials, have endured one national crisis after another, from the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001 to the 2007 economic recession and housing market crash and, most recently, the global coronavirus pandemic in 2020.
“I lived through a time when you came out of college and couldn’t find a job,” Cadore told theGrio. “We have experienced a variety of social justice issues, criminal justice issues [and] the Black Lives Matter movement.”
She also noted that millennials navigated the technology revolution, making them more astute at understanding cryptocurrency, AI and social media, which will be critical to engaging younger Americans. “All of these experiences have led to us having a very unique perspective on politics and government,” she explained.
Unlike previous generations who had to primarily focus on fighting for hard-fought civil rights, she said younger Americans are now fighting for “the opportunity to have a livable wage.”
“We’re fighting for the opportunity to purchase a home in the city that we actually live in, versus having to move somewhere that’s in a more affordable market,” said Cadore. She says Democrats missed the opportunity during the 2024 election cycle to connect with younger voters through technology and internet culture.
“My little brother is a gamer, and I remember him talking about how the video game community was discussing the presidential election, and everyone he saw talking about it was talking about Donald Trump,” she recalled. “Where were the Democrats in the video game community? This is a younger demographic of voters. They’re not your typical politically engaged community, but they do vote.”
Everton Blair, former board chairman of the Gwinnett County Board of Education, who is challenging 79-year-old Democratic U.S. Rep. David Scott in Georgia’s 13th Congressional District, told theGrio that after Democrats received a “shellacking” by Republicans in the 2024 election, it became clear to him that “the people that got us there are not the people who are going to get us out.”
While Congressman Scott has raised concerns about his health for years, Blair, 33, said he decided to primary Scott in the 2026 midterm election after attending the congressman’s town hall earlier this year in January.
“I was actually kind of appalled at his lack of candor, accessibility, and willingness to address the elephant issues in the room,” Blair said of the town hall. The Harvard graduate and doctoral student recalled Scott hosting a panel of experts from the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Social Security Administration, but failed to address the “attacks on those agencies” by the Trump administration through federal cuts that Congress did not approve.
“They didn’t center any of the needs of how we should be fighting to buck up against the Trump administration, to safeguard some of the resources, especially financial resources, that people in the room were depending on,” Blair told theGrio. He said Rep. Scott was “defensive” when confronted by constituents–including him.
“I went up and asked a question in good faith, and his response was very dismissive. It was the rudest I had ever been spoken to by an elected official,” said Blair.
While the young Democratic candidate said he isn’t necessarily running against Congressman Scott because of his age, he does believe there’s a “strong argument” for term limits in Congress.
“People just do not need to serve for more than two decades, and I think, particularly when each member represents a constituency of 700,000 to a million people, the argument that only one person can do that well, or the best, for more than 20 years, falls short,” said Blair. “There’s a lot of room for bringing new voices and new people in at a much higher frequency than we currently do.”
Christian Menefee, who is also running for Texas’ 18th Congressional District in a crowded race against Edwards, Cadore and others, told theGrio that he wants to reflect back the voices of young Democratic Black men in the halls of Congress — a demographic he said isn’t often represented on Capitol Hill.
The soon-to-be former Harris County attorney (Menefee resigned from the post to run for Congress) said, “I know what it means to be a young Black man who’s fighting for progress and in Republican Texas. You have to be strategic. You have to be unafraid. You’ve got to be focused on delivering for the people who are counting on you. And our generation just can’t afford to wait.”
Menefee, whose office has filed lawsuits against the Trump administration over frozen or eliminated funding, decried the president’s rolling back of civil rights and other actions he said will only harm already vulnerable communities.
Recalling concerns about Black men “straying” from the Democratic Party in last year’s election, Menefee said Trump’s actions will likely ensure that a generation of young Black men will “understand the danger of the Republican Party and how they’re trying to dismantle” economic and social progress for Black communities.
However, the attorney said his party must work to win back the support of young voters and voters of color.
“You’ve got to engage. You’ve got to talk about the issues that are important to them,” he said. “You can’t just assume that folks are going to vote for you because you aren’t the Republican Party.”
