Throughout history, U.S. political leaders and candidates have embraced new technologies, including FD Roosevelt's radio chats and the first televised debates between R. Nixon and JF Kennedy, to communicate their their message and connect with voters (Vergeer, 2012). Today's expanding technological landscape presents future presidential candidates with the challenge of integrating the Internet and social media into their campaign strategy. Voter demographics are changing as the Millennial generation, defined by the Pew Research Center as citizens born between 1977 and 1992 (Zickuhr, 2010), fills the entire population with young voters and begins to enter the adult voter pool . By the time of the 2016 presidential election, the entire population of young voters will be made up entirely of young adults born and raised with technology in their lives. This essay will show how, with the growing Millennial voter population, an American presidential candidate cannot succeed without a proper social media strategy. Who are the Millennials? Millennials, according to the Pew Research Center (2012), the new generation of young voters, constitute the most racially and ethnically diverse age group to date. Voters ages 18 to 29 report that only 58% are non-Hispanic white, 18% Hispanic, 17% African American, and 7% mixed or other. By comparison, voters age 30 and older report that 76% are non-Hispanic white, 8% Hispanic, 12% African American and 4% other. In addition to a more racially diverse population, women outnumber men in the 18-44 age group, at 55%, compared to about 51% for those ages 45 and older. Another factor that plays a significant role in demographic change is religion, young voters report regularly attending religious services...... middle of paper ......eau [WWW Document]. URL http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/socdemo/voting/publications/p20/2008/tables.html (accessed 12.12.13a).US Census Bureau, DID, nd Voting and Registration in the Election of November 2012 - Tables - Census Bureau [WWW Document]. URL http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/socdemo/voting/publications/p20/2012/tables.html (accessed 12.12.13b).Vaccari, C., 2010. “Technology Is a Commodity”: The Internet in the 2008 United States presidential election. Journal of Information Technology & Politics 7, 318–339. Vergeer, M., 2013. Politics, elections and online campaigns: past, present. . . and a look to the future. New Media Society 15, 9–17. Zhang, W., Seltzer, T., Bichard, S.L., 2013. Two sides of the coin: Assessing the influence of social networking site use during the 2012 US presidential campaign. Review of computers in social science 0894439313489962.