Youth and Democracy panel happening in Bentonville Wednesday

BENTONVILLE, Ark. —

A bipartisan group of young Arkansas state legislators will host the Youth and Democracy panel in Bentonville Wednesday.

Republican Rep. Aaron Pilkington and Democratic Rep. Jamie Scott are holding the panel with the Millennial Action Project.

The panel is from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday at the fermentation hall in the Momentary.

Layla Zaidane, the president and CEO of the Millennial Action Project, said the group supports political figures who are under the age of 45 and works to engage young lawmakers across the country.

“We think that young people have what it takes to transcend the toxic political polarization that is holding our country back. We exist to help them be successful at overcoming that. We connect them to each other, we give them resources, trainings, leadership development to help them be successful and build bipartisan solutions,” Zaidane said.

The panel will discuss the lawmakers’ goals for the 2023 Arkansas legislative session, and Zaidane said they’ll discuss what it’s like to be a young person in politics.

“We actually saw a 57% increase in young people running for office, 57% increase in young people running. The winners were pretty split between Democrats and Republicans,” Zaidane. “I think that’s important, because it shows that young people are interested in political and civic engagement. They are showing up with lots of different political backgrounds and ideologies. Now is really the moment to channel that energy.”

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