Jack Paul 
Survey Reveals Surprising Political Divide
A new poll from the Heartland Institute and Rasmussen Reports has uncovered something unexpected. Younger conservatives appear more willing than their liberal counterparts to hand over significant government functions to artificial intelligence. The survey, which reached 1,496 likely voters aged 18 to 39 in late October and early November, asked about proposals that would give AI control over public policy decisions, constitutional rights determinations, and even command of the world’s largest militaries.
What makes this particularly interesting is that it comes despite years of conservative complaints about AI systems leaning left politically. The findings seem to contradict what you might expect given those concerns.
Trust in Institutions at Record Lows
Donald Kendal from the Heartland Institute, who helped conduct the survey, expressed surprise at the results. He thinks the support might reflect broader dissatisfaction with existing institutions. “We’ve got so little trust, faith in our institutions,” Kendal told Decrypt. “There’s such a terrible approval rating of Congress that it’s so bad that we might as well just blow it all up and start from scratch.”
This sentiment aligns with recent polling data. An October 2025 Gallup poll showed only 15% of Americans approve of how Congress is handling its job. When trust in human-led institutions hits these lows, some people might see AI as a fresh alternative, even if they have concerns about its political leanings.
The AI Bias Reality
The survey results become even more puzzling when you consider the documented political biases in major AI systems. Multiple studies have found that large language models tend to produce left-of-center responses. A Public Choice study showed this pattern, and the Manhattan Institute reported similar findings about ChatGPT framing Democratic positions more favorably than Republican ones.
More recently, a 2024 American Enterprise Institute review of GPT-4, Claude, and Gemini found these systems rated right-leaning think tanks lower in “objectivity,” “morality,” and “quality” than left-leaning institutions. So the very systems that young conservatives seem willing to trust have demonstrated biases against conservative viewpoints.
Question Framing and Wishful Thinking
Kendal suggests that how the questions were framed might have influenced responses. The military question specifically mentioned AI control “with the express purpose of reducing the number of people who die from war.” That’s a sympathetic goal that might override concerns about political bias.
“If you’re taking that in good faith, fewer casualties of war is a fairly sympathetic dream,” Kendal noted. He thinks voters might be reasoning that if putting AI in charge could reduce war carnage, it’s worth trying since the current approach “isn’t working out.”
More than a third of young voters supported giving AI control of the world’s largest armies according to the survey. That’s a significant number, though it still means most respondents weren’t comfortable with the idea.
The Danger of Misunderstanding AI
Kendal worries that the support levels reveal a fundamental misunderstanding about how AI systems actually work. “One of the things I try to drive home is dispelling this illusion that artificial intelligence is unbiased,” he said. “It is very clearly biased, and some of that is passive.”
As society relies more heavily on AI, Kendal warns that we’re doing so “at our own peril and with a blindfold on, because these things aren’t obvious.” The biases built into AI systems aren’t always transparent, which makes the willingness to hand over significant power to them particularly concerning.
Perhaps what we’re seeing here isn’t so much about political ideology as it is about desperation for alternatives to systems that many young people feel have failed them. The survey doesn’t necessarily mean young conservatives have suddenly become AI enthusiasts, but rather that their frustration with current institutions might be leading them to consider options they’d otherwise reject.