They Shall Replace Them… So Make Sure They Cannot Vote

Texas students in line to vote

They Shall Replace Them… So Make Sure They Cannot Vote

The New GOP Enemy: Educated Younger Voters




There is no question that while younger voters are leery of both mainstream political parties, they are anything but ambivalent about their issues: Unaffordable housing, unaffordable post-secondary education (and student loans), inane conspiracy theories, intolerance particularly against diversity, personal freedom, democracy killers, pervasive gun ownership and most of all: failure to address climate change. They do not love the Democratic Party, but it is the Republicans who seem to be on the wrong side of most of the issues that matter most to them. Having not lived through the era of the “red scare” and the belief in a Communist-led domino theory of global conquest, words like “creeping socialism” are not viewed as anything they should worry about.

The higher the level of education – and as I have blogged many times before, the Gen Y and Z are far and away the best educated generations in American history – the greater their commitment to the above issues. Religious teachings to the contrary, these educated rising voters know that as greenhouse gasses continue to increase in the atmosphere, year-by-year, their quality of life, perhaps their very life and health, will continue to decline from the resulting disasters they expect will define their future. Their elders will not be around to suffer as much as they expect they will.

Given the pressure from the backbone of the GOP base – fundamental religious believers and conspiracy theorists with a few greedy billionaires for good measure who oppose or marginalize those generational issues – the Republican Party cannot effectively embrace Gen Y and Z issues without losing their base. But if they do not address those issues, that mass of future voters will defy the GOP. Not a good place to be.

The GOP response: in addition to finding ways to eliminate minority voters in urban areas likely to oppose the Republican agenda – through gerrymandering, voter suppression and even election rejection – the GOP is now focusing on how to keep those younger, educated voters from casting ballots. Red state initiatives drilling down on this demographic include raising the voting age from 18 – when young men can be drafted to fight for their country – to 21 or even as late as 28.

But there is a bigger initiative to disenfranchise Gen Z by raising the voting age is an effort to target those attending college, making voting difficult for them. Since actual elections tend to take place in early November, a time when most college students are away at their schools, it would make sense for a voter suppression campaign, a uniform policy only in red states, to make it more difficult for college students to vote at all. Students have defied those barriers in the midterms, stood in long lines in bad weather to cast ballots, and those youngest voters accounted for as estimated 27% of votes cast, enough to squash the projected red wave.

In surveys taken in September, before the midterms, “A new report by Knight Foundation and College Pulse found that most college students plan to vote in November. Of the 4,000 full-time students surveyed by the organizations, 71% are ‘absolutely certain’ they will vote this year… Historically, college students haven't turned out to vote in force. But the national student voting rate jumped from 19.3% in 2014 to 40.3% in 2018, according to Tufts University's Institute for Democracy & Higher Education.” TheBestSchools.com, September 20th. They voted at higher levels than ever before, but not at the promised rates. After facing confusing instructions and barriers to voting this year, it seems that younger voters are pushing for a change. Here what they face, particularly in GOP dominant states:

Pew Charitable Trust’s Stateline (November 18th) reports: “But fluid, confusing election rules still make it hard for college students to vote, said Caroline Smith, director of programs at the Andrew Goodman Foundation, a New Jersey-based group that supports voting on college campuses… Across the country, voting rights groups and collegiate get-out-the-vote organizers documented many cases of college students who struggled to decipher confusing voter ID requirements, waited in hours-long lines at polling places or never received their absentee ballots. In some cases, college voters were even denied federally protected provisional ballots.

“While Election Day generally went smoothly for voters nationwide, these sporadic incidents may have disenfranchised some college students, youth vote advocates say. They want state lawmakers to expand same-day voter registration, better train election staff, encourage college students to serve as poll workers and work with universities to make it easier for college students to vote… Voter ID requirements were especially puzzling for many college students.

“College students are highly mobile. They might be registered to vote at their parents’ home in one state and then want to vote on their campus the next year in another state. Once in school, they rarely live in just one residence during their entire college experience, often moving to a new address every year. Still, they have the right to vote as college students living on or near campus.

“Thirty-five states require identification to vote, and seven of them do not accept student IDs as proof, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In many states, GOP legislators have opposed same-day registration, citing fears that people might vote in two states or use fake identification to commit voter fraud.

“Last year in New Hampshire, a Republican lawmaker proposed a bill that would have explicitly prohibited college students from using their address at an educational institution to register to vote. The bill died in committee… Republican state Rep. Norman Silber, the bill’s sponsor, told Stateline that current state law creates a special class for college students to register to vote in the state. He wants to eliminate that privilege and ensure that only permanent residents — for example, those with New Hampshire driver’s licenses — can vote.” This push pull might work. As students get older, the GOP may hope they meld into a conservative mindset… or these younger voters may never forget what the Republican Party tried to do to keep them from voting.

I’m Peter Dekom, and increasingly for all the major challenges we face as a nation, even as an entire planet, there are signs not only that these younger generations really care… but that they are ready to take on those challenges headlong, starting with voting!

Texas students in line to vote

They Shall Replace Them… So Make Sure They Cannot Vote

The New GOP Enemy: Educated Younger Voters

There is no question that while younger voters are leery of both mainstream political parties, they are anything but ambivalent about their issues: Unaffordable housing, unaffordable post-secondary education (and student loans), inane conspiracy theories, intolerance particularly against diversity, personal freedom, democracy killers, pervasive gun ownership and most of all: failure to address climate change. They do not love the Democratic Party, but it is the Republicans who seem to be on the wrong side of most of the issues that matter most to them. Having not lived through the era of the “red scare” and the belief in a Communist-led domino theory of global conquest, words like “creeping socialism” are not viewed as anything they should worry about.

The higher the level of education – and as I have blogged many times before, the Gen Y and Z are far and away the best educated generations in American history – the greater their commitment to the above issues. Religious teachings to the contrary, these educated rising voters know that as greenhouse gasses continue to increase in the atmosphere, year-by-year, their quality of life, perhaps their very life and health, will continue to decline from the resulting disasters they expect will define their future. Their elders will not be around to suffer as much as they expect they will.

Given the pressure from the backbone of the GOP base – fundamental religious believers and conspiracy theorists with a few greedy billionaires for good measure who oppose or marginalize those generational issues – the Republican Party cannot effectively embrace Gen Y and Z issues without losing their base. But if they do not address those issues, that mass of future voters will defy the GOP. Not a good place to be.

The GOP response: in addition to finding ways to eliminate minority voters in urban areas likely to oppose the Republican agenda – through gerrymandering, voter suppression and even election rejection – the GOP is now focusing on how to keep those younger, educated voters from casting ballots. Red state initiatives drilling down on this demographic include raising the voting age from 18 – when young men can be drafted to fight for their country – to 21 or even as late as 28.

But there is a bigger initiative to disenfranchise Gen Z by raising the voting age is an effort to target those attending college, making voting difficult for them. Since actual elections tend to take place in early November, a time when most college students are away at their schools, it would make sense for a voter suppression campaign, a uniform policy only in red states, to make it more difficult for college students to vote at all. Students have defied those barriers in the midterms, stood in long lines in bad weather to cast ballots, and those youngest voters accounted for as estimated 27% of votes cast, enough to squash the projected red wave.

In surveys taken in September, before the midterms, “A new report by Knight Foundation and College Pulse found that most college students plan to vote in November. Of the 4,000 full-time students surveyed by the organizations, 71% are ‘absolutely certain’ they will vote this year… Historically, college students haven't turned out to vote in force. But the national student voting rate jumped from 19.3% in 2014 to 40.3% in 2018, according to Tufts University's Institute for Democracy & Higher Education.” TheBestSchools.com, September 20th. They voted at higher levels than ever before, but not at the promised rates. After facing confusing instructions and barriers to voting this year, it seems that younger voters are pushing for a change. Here what they face, particularly in GOP dominant states:

Pew Charitable Trust’s Stateline (November 18th) reports: “But fluid, confusing election rules still make it hard for college students to vote, said Caroline Smith, director of programs at the Andrew Goodman Foundation, a New Jersey-based group that supports voting on college campuses… Across the country, voting rights groups and collegiate get-out-the-vote organizers documented many cases of college students who struggled to decipher confusing voter ID requirements, waited in hours-long lines at polling places or never received their absentee ballots. In some cases, college voters were even denied federally protected provisional ballots.

“While Election Day generally went smoothly for voters nationwide, these sporadic incidents may have disenfranchised some college students, youth vote advocates say. They want state lawmakers to expand same-day voter registration, better train election staff, encourage college students to serve as poll workers and work with universities to make it easier for college students to vote… Voter ID requirements were especially puzzling for many college students.

“College students are highly mobile. They might be registered to vote at their parents’ home in one state and then want to vote on their campus the next year in another state. Once in school, they rarely live in just one residence during their entire college experience, often moving to a new address every year. Still, they have the right to vote as college students living on or near campus.

“Thirty-five states require identification to vote, and seven of them do not accept student IDs as proof, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In many states, GOP legislators have opposed same-day registration, citing fears that people might vote in two states or use fake identification to commit voter fraud.

“Last year in New Hampshire, a Republican lawmaker proposed a bill that would have explicitly prohibited college students from using their address at an educational institution to register to vote. The bill died in committee… Republican state Rep. Norman Silber, the bill’s sponsor, told Stateline that current state law creates a special class for college students to register to vote in the state. He wants to eliminate that privilege and ensure that only permanent residents — for example, those with New Hampshire driver’s licenses — can vote.” This push pull might work. As students get older, the GOP may hope they meld into a conservative mindset… or these younger voters may never forget what the Republican Party tried to do to keep them from voting.

I’m Peter Dekom, and increasingly for all the major challenges we face as a nation, even as an entire planet, there are signs not only that these younger generations really care… but that they are ready to take on those challenges headlong, starting with voting!