Dean Roy is not eligible to vote, not even close. He cannot legally drink alcohol, and on looks alone, is at risk of being booted from an R-rated movie theater. He must drive with an adult in the passenger seat.

He is, however, running for governor in his home state of Vermont — at age 15.

“The goal here,” said Dean, who sits at the edge of Generation Z and the still-inchoate Gen Alpha, “is to make enough of an impact that the leaders have to start paying attention to the youth voice.”

Older Gen Z politicians have been making waves this political season, challenging the gerontocracy and getting footholds in state legislatures and even Congress, but the next wave is not far behind, raised amid political polarization and extremism, congressional gridlock and weakened public trust in institutions.

“Young people see that we cannot afford a home, we can’t start a family, our work treats us like crap, climate change is destroying our home,” said Aiden Otterman, 17, who won the Democratic primary for state representative in his rural northeastern Vermont district this month. “It’s hopeless.”

Teenage politics may be unformed, but young Gen Zers and vanguard Gen Alphas have a distinct worldview after stewing on politics as entertainment, with political leaders as much a part of their social media diet as stand-up comics, “get ready with me” routines and skin care videos. Many of them believe the issues that most affect their futures have been ignored, such as online privacy and, at least for Dean, miniature, low-cost, fuel-efficient cars from Japan, which, he assures, are perfect “for those who live on flat ground and don’t drive too much.”

Dean, a rising high school sophomore, avoided this month’s Republican and Democratic primaries by creating a new party, under which his name will appear on the ballot in November: the Freedom and Unity Party. He was polling at 3 percent this summer in a University of New Hampshire survey, which under the circumstances is pretty good.

He concedes that many of Vermont’s 645,000 or so residents do not take his candidacy seriously. Gov. Phil Scott, a moderate Republican with one of the highest approval ratings in the country, is a prohibitive favorite for re-election.

But Dean brings his own kind of cred to the ballot.

“I have good grades, I enjoy Formula 1, I hang out with my friends all the time,” he said.

He lives with his parents and older brother in Stowe, a ski town of about 5,000 at the foot of the state’s highest peak, Mount Mansfield. He runs, cross-country skis and works part time at his parents’ pizza shop in nearby Waterbury.

In eighth grade, after he spent seven weeks in the statehouse in Montpelier assisting lawmakers, one of Dean’s teachers joked that he would be his campaign manager whenever he ran for office. Dean took him literally, did the research and discovered that Vermont had no age requirement for governor.

His parents considered his effort to get on the ballot a constructive summer project. First, he had to secure 500 signatures from eligible Vermont voters. Dean’s mother, Chessie, would drop him off at the town post office to talk to voters about why he was running.

“When he comes up with an idea, he does it,” Ms. Roy said.

She and her husband vote Democratic, she said, but they have encouraged their son to remain moderate, listen to both sides and avoid saying anything inflammatory.

On Instagram and TikTok, Dean posts videos of himself in front of an American flag hanging in his bedroom for about 6,000 followers. The state’s speed limit? Too low. Vermont’s housing shortage? He blames overly burdensome permitting. Climate change? Build more nuclear power plants.

His parents review the scripts, occasionally suggesting that he tone them down.

In one video after Elon Musk became the world’s first trillionaire, he announced that he would cap net worth in Vermont at $1 billion, still “an almost incomprehensible amount of money,” he said. “You can live 10,000 lifetimes and still never spend it all.”

In another, he denounced Australia’s social media ban for those under 16.

“The government shouldn’t be deciding what every kid can and can’t do online,” he said. “That’s the parents’ job.”

Dean often finds opportunities to praise policies from leaders he opposes. In one post, he said he was “a huge fan” of President Trump’s suggestion late last year that Japan’s fuel-efficient micro Kei cars be imported, even though he said he disagreed with most of the president’s policies. In another, he praised Gov. Scott for saying that he would be more open to nuclear power.

Dean’s peers appreciate his crossing the political aisles, said a friend, Charlie Zimmerman, 17.

“People need to be OK with not being just a Democrat or just a Republican,” said Charlie, who identifies as a liberal but admires Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky, a Republican, for bucking his party over the Epstein files. “There is so much polarization.”

Dean’s latest issue is privacy. In one video, he points out a Flock camera in a parking lot.

“America is becoming a surveillance state,” he said. “This is the start of a very dark path.”

And after November, what comes next?

“I’m interested in going to college because I could build so many connections there, but I might end up deciding to go down a completely different route,” Dean said. “I still, technically, have no idea.”

He’s got a few years to figure it out.