Maxwell Frost sees greater Gen Z influence on Congress as an improvement

Congress is getting younger, and Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) is at the forefront of it.

Frost, 29, is the only Generation Z member of Congress.

It’s a Congress still dominated by octogenarians — from Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.), 84, to Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), 88, and Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), 87. And then there’s Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who turns 93 later this month.

But believe it or not, the average age in the Congress is getting younger.

As of the start of the 119th Congress, the average age of members in the House was 57.5 and in the Senate was 64.7 — down from 57.9 and 65.3, respectively, according to the Pew Research Center. 

Frost, who was elected in 2023 to represent Florida’s 10th District, believes that’s a good thing and could stoke positive change in America.

“I do believe that we are a generation by and large that has these issues front of mind,” he said in an interview with The Feed, The Hill’s column on Gen Z.

Frost later added that Gen Z “would govern differently because we’re freshly going through what it means to be a young person in this country.”

Frost has hope for Gen Z, which he sees as a highly politically involved faction in the country that is “voting at the highest numbers we’ve seen young people vote in our country’s history” and “running for office at historic numbers.” 

However, despite his excitement at a potentially younger legislative branch, Frost doesn’t think age is everything.

It’s a politician’s ideas, he says, that are ultimately what’s important.

“What we have to be careful of as voters and as people is younger leadership doesn’t always mean new ideas,” Frost........

© The Hill