As the average age of politicians continues to rise and health issues related to age start to gain more traction on the news, people have started wondering if there should be a term or age limit for some politicians.
Currently, politicians have no term or age limits, allowing them to continuously run for office until they can no longer do so. Despite having no age limits, some positions do have age requirements. For example, one must be at least 35 years old to run for president, 30 years old to run for the Senate, 25 years old to run for the United States’ House of Representatives, and at least 18 for most other government official positions; the age minimum for running for state government varies by state.
“[Old politicians] are not with the times,” Edison Webb (12) said. “You’re not … in tune with how things are for working people today. You might’ve been in tune like 4 years ago but today’s stuff is different. I think you can see this especially when [politicians] start talking about college tuition. You have some senators right now who went to college for like 500 bucks and then be like ‘I worked my way through college, why can’t you?’ It shows … their age and how much the country has changed since the last time they’ve been in college.”
A politician’s age allows them to align more closely with certain demographics and their concerns on specific issues. Some argue that despite being able to align with some of their voters, older politicians are not addressing issues like internet safety and self-driving cars are falling behind in the ever-changing world.
“If you have someone in power, especially for a long time, then they have interest groups and [politicians] going to vote according to what the interest groups [would] want them to vote [for on specific legislation],” Erika Sugarmon, teacher and Shelby County Commissioner said. “For example, gun lobbyists … they’re typically paid for by [the National Rifle Association, also known as,] NRA or gun manufacturers and stuff like that. So politicians are — especially if they get contributions, they’re going to vote according to the interests of the lobbyists. That’s more so the issue than anything, that’s not necessarily [mean] that [politicians] are out of touch.”
According to the 2020 election, the registered voters aged 50 and up has risen from 41% in 1996 to 52%. The median age is another way to consider the aging of the electorate. In 2019, the median age of all registered voters increased from 44 to 50. Especially with Generation Z voters starting to become a sizable part of the current voting demographic and some even running for office, many wonder if current U.S. politicians proportionately reflect the ideas of Americans today.
Some advocate for a term or age limit that would prevent one from running for office after holding that position for a couple of election cycles or after hitting a certain age.
“When you have politicians that are so old they can’t make policies that are good for the majority of the population and when they’re trying to satisfy people who they aren’t able to identify with, it just leads to a failure of being able to make good legislation,” Jack Feng (9) said.
On the other hand, some believe that the age of politicians is due to their ability to run for office indefinitely rather than the lack of an age limit. Rather than imposing an age limit on politicians, Sugarmon believes that politicians should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis rather than generalizing their mental competency or ability to run for office.
“I have a problem with, not necessarily the age but people being [in] office for [an] unlimited amount of time, there’s a problem with that because not only [does] age play [a] factor but also corruption,” Sugarmon said. “Let’s say [you are a] U.S. Senator — limitless or state senator, state representative, and [in] certain states like in Tennessee or at the federal level, there’s no limits. And so you’re not accountable, you don’t have to be held accountable to the people. So, you get away with a lot of things that you shouldn’t do.”
