(Radio Iowa) – The non-profit an Iowa legislator co-founded to mentor Generation Z conservatives who’re entering politics is now one of Snapchat’s partners in a push to encourage young people to consider running for local office.  “You could potentially be the next governor of your state, right? Or the next congressman in the next five, to 10 to 15 years, but it starts here at the local and state level.” That’s State Representative Joe Mitchell of Mount Pleasant. His Run GenZ group had 200 contacts in the past 10 months, but that jumped to 15-hundred in the first 24 hours after Snapchat’s launch.

“Just encouraging people if they’re frustrated with what’s happening in their school board or if they’re frustrated with what’s happening in their state legislature, it’s time to stop complaining, right? It’s time to start running,” Mitchell says. Mitchell was 20 years old when he first ran for and won a seat in the Iowa House in 2018. “What I realized was my age actually a lot of time helped me when I talked to people at the doors,” Mitchell says, “…but the other thing was, too, I had the time and the energy to be able to go out there and knock on a bunch of doors.”

Mitchell, who’s now in his second term in the Iowa House, launched Run GenZ last year. It offers advice and support to people from his generation who are thinking about running for state and local office. “There’s not a ton of people on either side of the aisle really, but specifically conservatives in the local and state offices that are proportionally representing our generation,” Mitchell says, “or just people under 40.”

Four other Republicans in their 20s are co-founders of Run Gen Z. Two are women serving in Florida’s legislature. One is a New Hampshire lawmaker who Mitchell says is one of only four openly gay Republicans in elected office in the U.S. and one is a black man who won a seat in West Virginia’s legislature at the age of 18.  “People of color and women and peole that are gay and straight, whatever else,” Mitchell says. Mitchell says having a diverse group is important because it fits the ethos of young Americans who were born around the turn of the century.

In addition to Mitchell’s group supporting conservative candidates, Snapchat has partnered with nine other organizations across the political spectrum to encourage young adults to run for office. For example, one is called Emerge America and its candidate recruitment is focused on Democratic women. According to SnapChat, 90 percent of Americans between the ages of 13 and 24 use the social media platform. Those express an interest in running for political office through a new tool within the app are matched up and referred to the outside groups for advice.

Former Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, who was elected to the Iowa House at the age of 25, is on the national advisory board for Run GenZ. Former Texas Governor Rick Perry, former Colorado Governor Bill Owens, former New Hampshire Governor John Sununu and former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie are on the board, too.