Young Conservatives Have A New Mascot, And He’s A Sith Lord

With Republicans having brutally lost Congress after Tuesday’s midterm elections, young conservatives on the internet are glorifying the authoritarian and genocidal actions of a new mascot, made famous in the “Star Wars” space opera movie franchise.

The fictional Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker — who eventually embraces evil to become iconic villain Darth Vader — has emerged as an unlikely political icon among young right-wing internet users, who are posting to social media memes and dramatic video edits celebrating his descent into authoritarianism. The trend, which predates the 2026 midterms, reflects growing resentment toward established institutions, generational divides, and dissatisfaction with modern society, according to Know Your Meme, which refers to the phenomenon as “Anakin Skywalker Gen Z Male Rage Memes.”

Young white men, a demographic which helped fuel President Donald Trump’s 2024 victory, turned elsewhere in the midterms, backing Democratic House candidates by a 10-point margin. White voters under 30 years of age supported Democrats 61% to 36%, reversing their 2024 preference for Trump, who won 54% of the demographic compared to then-Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris’s 44%, according to Tufts University.

The trend, sometimes called “Anakin-maxxing,” gained traction throughout October as younger users began comparing their frustrations with the Republican Party to Skywalker’s increasingly bitter relationship with the seemingly rigid Jedi Council.

One compilation of such memes posted by an Austrian conservative account on X shows a wide variety of topics, from mass migration to transgenderism and even economic collapse.

One of the “Anakin-maxxing” memes posted by the conservative X account “Necromancer” references the infamous attack on USS Liberty by Israeli forces, alluding to it as forbidden knowledge “not a story the Republicans would tell you.”

Israeli fighter jets and torpedo boats attacked the USS Liberty, an American intelligence-gathering vessel operating in international waters during the 1967 Six-Day War, on June 8, killing 34 Americans and wounding 171, according to the U.S. Navy. Several former senior American intelligence officials, including two former National Security Agency directors, have argued the attack was deliberate, according to the U.S. Naval Institute, although Israel maintains its forces mistakenly identified the American vessel as an Egyptian ship, according to State Department records.

One of the Anakin-focused memes posted by The Blaze columnist Auron MacIntyre makes fun of claims by baby boomers that obstacles to personal economic advancement are related to Gen Z’s eating habits.

If you wanted to own a house before 40 you should have never ate that burrito Anakin https://t.co/ofcuZK3ugC

— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) November 2, 2026

The online fascination also mirrors an earlier wave of American empire memes celebrating expansionism and military power among young conservatives.