About half of Americans say best age for president is under 60: Pew survey

Nearly half of Americans said they would prefer a president that is under 60, according to a new survey.

Disconnected from current candidates, 49 percent of respondents said the best age for a president is in their 50s, according to a study from the Pew Research Center. That’s followed by 24 percent who said they would want someone in their 60s, and 17 percent said someone in their 40s. 

Only three percent of respondents said the best age for a president is in their 70s or older.

The survey illustrates a disconnect between the desires of many Americans for a younger leader and the ages of likely presidential nominees. President Biden is 80 years old and leading Republican candidate former President Trump is 77. 

Biden’s age has garnered concern from voters of all parties in recent opinion polling.

Pew survey also found that younger people believe presidents would be considered "in their prime" when they are younger, and similarly older Americans believe the prime age is older. 

Over a third of respondents between 18-29 said the best age for a president is in their 40s, while only 3 percent of respondents over 70 years old agreed. In contrast, 42 percent of the oldest respondents said their 60s is a president’s best age, while just under a quarter of the youngest respondents answered the same.

Results are similar between the two political parties if you adjust for the average age of party members, researchers said. Because the Democratic Party tends to have younger members, the party’s respondents said younger is more preferable for a president.

Democrats’ responses are also similar to answers to the same survey question in 2019, researchers said. Republicans were not asked the question that year.

Biden has joked about his age before, acknowledging that he was the country’s youngest senator, and the sixth-youngest senator ever, when he was first elected in 1972.

“By the way, I’ve been doing this a long time. I know I don’t look that old. I know. I’m a little under 103,” he said earlier this year during the White House Correspondents Dinner. “But all kidding aside … I was a pretty powerful senator.”

The Pew survey was conducted from June 5-11, with a total of 5,115 respondents. The margin of error for the full sample was plus or minus 1.7 percentage points.