These college students are mad about Gaza – but it won’t drive their vote: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the campaign trail, the White House and Capitol Hill.

In today’s edition, national political reporter Ben Kamisar breaks down our latest focus groups with young voters in battleground Wisconsin. Plus, senior national political reporter Jonathan Allen notes how President Joe Biden leaned into a "law" and "order message in response to campus protests.

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These young voters are mad about Gaza — but don’t see it driving their vote

By Ben Kamisar

They’re mad about the situation in Gaza, and they’re not going to take it anymore. But they probably aren’t going to vote on it.

That was the key takeaway from the latest NBC News Deciders focus groups — in collaboration with Engagious, Syracuse University and Sago — of independent Wisconsin college students. Virtually all of the 16 students we spoke to backed the wave of pro-Palestinian protests sweeping college campuses and held dim views of President Joe Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war, and some have even participated in the protests themselves.

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Pushed to reckon with how the issue may influence their vote in the presidential election, few said they expected it to change who they will for, except for a few who questioned whether they may be less likely to cast a ballot at all.

Why? Largely because they don’t see Biden and former President Donald Trump as having meaningfully different stances on Israel.

“I don’t think Biden is doing a great job; I don’t think Trump would do a better job. … As it stands, I can’t see