No cap – and not necessarily voting. Will the youngest voters show up on Election Day?
Various groups are exhorting young people to go out and vote, but registration is still low, and previous elections don’t bode particularly well. Some Florida activists have been pulling out the stops in their efforts to get Gen Z voters to step up and be counted in this election.
Postcards encouraging people to vote. (Photo by Dan Dennis via Unsplash)
By Alexander Tabares | MediaLab@FAU
Oct 29, 2024
Nicholas Ostheimer was born three weeks too late to vote in the upcoming election. He wishes he could vote on Nov. 5, so instead he involves himself in the political sphere by urging others to vote on Florida Atlantic University’s breezeway.
“There’s no age limit on organizing or on activism or on getting other people registered,” said Ostheimer, a 17-year-old junior political science major.
Ostheimer regularly sits at the Florida College Democrats tent, signing people up to track their voting status at FAU. He volunteers for the FAU College Democrats as his form of representation in this election, as he will be too young to vote in this coming election. He collects contacts along FAU’s Breezeway, a thoroughfare running through the Boca Raton campus – to provide young passersby information on voter registration, early voting, mail-in voting and local polling locations.
The youth vote has consistently played a vital role in determining the outcomes of presidential elections, especially in close races. Despite a nearly 50% turnout in the 2020 election for Americans age 18 to 24, voter registration continues to be lowest among young people. In CNN’s 2020 Exit Poll by age breakdown of voters, 66% were 45 or older. Many other polls suggest a similarly low percentage of young people who show up to vote. Even during Ronald Reagan’s administration, 18 to 24-year-olds had the lowest participation in the polls, a trend that continues to persist today.
“Historically, younger voters turn out at a lower rate than older voters do, but that's not always true,” Dr. Kevin Wagner, co-executive director of Florida Atlantic University’s Political Communication and Public Opinion Research Lab (PolCom Lab), said. “In 2008, with Barack Obama, the youth vote turned out in particularly high numbers.”
When Joe Biden was on the ticket, Dr. Wagner explained, the youth vote was expected to be lower for this election. However, there is increasing polling evidence that “young voters are more excited to turn out now.” Despite this, Trump still commands a lead among youth, with 50% of younger voters ages 18 to 49. That is, according to a national poll from the Florida Atlantic University PolComLab.
Although there is an increase in likely voters since Harris replaced Biden on the ticket, this year’s election researchers predict an even lower percentage of eligible young voters showing up at the polls. According to The Civics Center, a Los Angeles-based organization, voter registration for 18 and 19-year-olds dropped below 40% nationwide compared to the 2020 election. All other age groups lie well above 50%, with almost 80% of people aged 45 and older being registered to vote.
“I see voting as a way for people to start arguing,” said Christian Sullivan, a student at FAU, in defense of his decision not to vote in the upcoming election.
This sentiment reflects a broader trend that is even more startling in South Florida, with voter registration at approximately 25% for 18-year-olds in Miami-Dade County according to findings by The Civics Center. These low numbers signal a stark lack of engagement in a crucial state that once decided the entire election in 2000 between Al Gore and George W. Bush.
People are seeking solutions to inspire the youth to vote in greater numbers in South Florida.
Other groups are pushing for an increase in youth voter turnout off-campus. One political action committee (PAC), Florida Future Leaders, was created to help remedy the situation and encourage young people to register to vote. The St.Petersburg-based group’s main goal is to encourage young voters through youth-organized campaign events. Ostheimer is himself a campus organizer with Florida Future Leaders.
The margins of victory in many key Florida districts were slim in the 2020 election, including in FAU and Florida State University’s respective districts. The margins were especially tight, considering that enough voters who did not participate could have swung either district. Florida Future Leaders is seeking to turn these contested districts blue in the upcoming election. The PAC raised $100,000 in its first month of fundraising according to Florida Politics, and is expected to raise over one million dollars by the end of the election cycle. Founded by Jayden D’Onofrio – a Tallahassee-based student activist who is just a year out of high school – and Florida College Democrats President Alexis Dorman, they are seeking to flip the once-purple state blue by encouraging young people to vote. They see the youth vote as integral to achieving this goal.
“I think the vast majority of youth voters are tired of the policies we are seeing here in Florida,” D’Onofrio said in an interview with MediaLab@FAU. “Especially with those two ballot amendments [Amendments 3 and 4], we are going to see a supercharged turnout from the youth to the polls this election.”
Many other initiatives seek to capture the youth vote, but percentages are still lower than the previous election, and poor voter turnout could influence the election negatively. This election will see an estimated 8 million new eligible voters able to sway the election in any way they may choose.