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Category: Voter Registration
September 28, 2015

Registering the Rising American Electorate: Now is the Time

As part of our year-round voter registration program, the Voter Participation Center is helping to register unmarried women, people of color, and young voters—the groups that make up the Rising American Electorate (RAE)—for the 2016 election. VPC is mailing voter registration forms to 1.4 million RAE members in 8 states. (You can read more about our mail program here.)

The chart below shows the huge number of unregistered members of the RAE—particularly unmarried women—and the opportunity to reshape the electorate in these eight states.

  Rising American Electorate Unmarried Women
State

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% of VEP

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Registered

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%

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Unreg.

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%

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% of VEP

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Registered

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%

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Unreg.

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%

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Colorado 49% 1,149,895 62% 695,784 38% 22% 546,725 66% 283,499 34%
Florida 58% 4,818,782 60% 3,269,845 40% 26% 2,184,986 60% 1,452,963 40%
Iowa 45% 601,659 59% 413,038 41% 23% 325,929 62% 198,167 38%
North Carolina 56% 2,439,168 63% 1,406,290 37% 26% 1,147,794 64% 656,032 36%
Nevada 62% 616,901 53% 543,057 47% 26% 266,875 55% 215,404 45%
Pennsylvania 47% 2,531,540 57% 1,947,017 43% 24% 1,404,064 61% 892,563 39%
Virginia 56% 1,941,775 59% 1,328,439 41% 24% 831,891 59% 568,104 41%
Wisconsin 45% 1,137,583 60% 759,954 40% 24% 637,094 63% 370,210 37%

(VEP: Vote-Eligible Population)

Data Source: Current Population Survey: Voting and Registration Supplement, 2014. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census.

September 22, 2015

National Voter Registration Day: The Unregistered, but Rising, American Electorate

Today is National Voter Registration Day, and perhaps the most important National Voter Registration Day ever because of the decisive role the Rising American Electorate (RAE)—unmarried women, people of color, and millennials—will have in the 2016 election.

In 2016, the RAE will make up 57% of Americans eligible to vote and they’re poised to make up the majority of the electorate. That’s why many now call them the New American Majority. But that can only happen if they’re registered to vote—and as this map we posted a few weeks ago makes clear, there are a lot of states where huge numbers of the RAE aren’t registered to vote, including in states key to the outcome of the 2016 presidential election:

Rising American Electorate Voter Registration by State

Hover your mouse over a state to see the numbers and percentages of unmarried women, people of color and Millennials who are not registered to vote.
% of RAE Not Registered
 
25-29%
 
30-34%
 
35-39%
 
40-44%
 
45-49%
 
50-54%
 
55% +

Unregistered RAE By State

Data Source: Current Population Survey: Voting and Registration Supplement, 2014. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census

That’s why our ongoing mail and online registration programs, which focus on the Rising American Electorate, are such an important part of our mission—because we believe our nation is stronger when every eligible American can cast a ballot and make their voice heard on Election Day.

And if you’re not registered to vote yet, make sure you’re registered!

September 16, 2015

Webinar: Gearing Up for 2016

Highlights from the most recent U.S. Census figures illustrate the decisive role unmarried women and the rest of the Rising American Electorate will play in the 2016 elections.

The video of our September 16 webinar features VPC president and founder Page Gardner and nationally-prominent pollster Celinda Lake, discussing how population and electoral trends among theRising American Electorate in 2014 inform the 2016 cycle .

September 11, 2015

Unmarried Women Could Decide 2016... if they Register.

By November 2016, for the first time more unmarried women than married women will be eligible to vote—meaning they could decide the election.

But only if they register and vote—and as of 2014, 22.4 million unmarried women (almost 40%) weren’t registered, including almost 10 million unmarried women under the age of 30.

Here’s a race/ethnicity and age breakdown of unregistered unmarried women:

Group # Unregistered
Unmarried White Women 13,145,524
Unmarried African-American Women 3,913,991
Unmarried Latinas 3,722,100
Unmarried Women 18-30 9,875,219
Unmarried Women 30-50 5,405,848
Unmarried Women 50+ 7,155,603
August 28, 2015

Project Vote: Online Voter Registration in the States

As Pennsylvania becomes the 23rd state to allow online voter registration (OVR) our friends at Project Vote have prepared an updated list, not only of those states that currently offer OVR, but states where OVR is approved, but not yet implemented.

From ProjectVote.org:

Over the past several years, online registration has made steady progress in reforming voter registration in the states. At this writing, 29 states and the District of Columbia have passed legislation or made administrative changes to enable individuals to register to vote completely electronically.

August 27, 2015

Map the Change: Registering the Rising American Electorate will Transform the Landscape

In our last post, we focused on the massive numbers of unmarried women who are not registered to vote in key 2016 states.  But unmarried women are just one part of the Rising American Electorate (RAE), which also includes people of color and Millennials. Together they make up well over the majority—close to 57 percent—of the U.S. population eligible to vote, but in the 2014 general election they only cast 44% of the votes.

As this interactive map makes very clear, if even a small percentage of unregistered RAE voters register and vote in 2016, it would have an enormous impact on national, state and local elections.

Rising American Electorate Voter Registration by State

Hover your mouse over a state to see the numbers and percentages of unmarried women, people of color and Millennials who are not registered to vote.

Unregistered RAE By State

% of RAE Not Registered
25-29%
30-34%
35-39%
40-44%
45-49%
50-54%
55% +

Data Source: Current Population Survey: Voting and Registration Supplement, 2014. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census

August 27, 2015

Stanford: Reaching the "Invisible" Americans

At least 11 percent of adult American citizens are “unlisted” and do not appear on voter registration lists or consumer data lists, according to a new study (PDF) by the Stanford University political science department. The study reports that about 20 percent of African Americans and Hispanics are unlisted, compared to just 8 percent of whites. “A sizable proportion of the U.S. citizen population does not appear on these lists, making them invisible to list-based campaigns and research,” the study finds.

The consequence? The absence of these unlisted voters leads to a whiter, older, more conservative electorate that does not reflect the true America. “We find that if unregistered and unlisted people voted at comparable rates to registered people with the same level of interest in politics, both the 2000 and 2004 Presidential elections would have been won by Democrats,” authors Simon Jackman and Bradley Spahn write. “The unlisted earn less income and are less likely to have health insurance or own their own home than the listed population [and] have markedly lower levels of political engagement.”

For the past decade, the Voter Participation Center has been dedicated to identifying and registering members of the Rising American Electorate—many of the same “unlisted” Americans identified in the survey. While we have been successful in helping more than 2.6 million Americans register to vote, the study makes clear that we need to continue to embrace novel techniques to reach these “invisible” Americans. 

VPC has been a pioneer in the use of sophisticated research and tools to increase the participation of unmarried women and other historically underrepresented groups. We will continue to locate these unlisted Americans, using address-based outreach to people whom we cannot individually target and other unique tools, to make sure that no one is left standing on the sidelines of our democracy.

To read the full study, please click here (PDF).

August 20, 2015

Unmarried Women: The Key to Unlocking the New American Electorate

An astonishing number of single women aren’t yet registered to vote. If we help even a small percentage more of unmarried women register and vote, we’d likely see different results up and down the ballot in key 2016 states.

(Click on a state name in the table to view our demographic profile of unmarried women for that state.)

State Unmarried Women % of Vote-Eligible Population Registered to Vote Not Registered to Vote
Colorado 830,224 22% 546,725 (66%) 283,499 (34%)
Florida 3,637,949 26% 2,184,986 (60%) 1,452,963 (40%)
Iowa 524,096 23% 325,929 (62%) 198,167 (38%)
Missouri 1,010,097 23% 665,390 (66%) 344,707 (34%)
Nevada 482,278 26% 266,875 (55%) 215,404 (45%)
New Hampshire 239,332 24% 146,705 (61%) 92,627 (39%)
North Carolina 1,803,826 26% 1,147,794 (64%) 656,032 (36%)
Ohio 2,171,933 26% 1,341,439 (62%) 830,495 (38%)
Pennsylvania 2,296,628 24% 1,404,064 (61%) 892,563 (39%)
Virginia 1,399,995 24% 831,891 (59%) 568,104 (41%)
Wisconsin 1,007,304 24% 637,094 (63%) 370,210 (37%)

Data Source: Current Population Survey: Voting and Registration Supplement, 2014. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census.

August 11, 2015

Best Opportunities to Expand the 2016 Electorate

In 2016, the members of the Rising American Electorate (RAE)—unmarried women, people of color and Millennials aged 18-35—will make up at least 56 percent of the U.S. population eligible to vote. But right now, more than four in ten (42 percent) of the RAE are not registered to vote. The largest RAE subgroups that are least likely to be registered are Millennials, Hispanics and unmarried women. The greatest opportunity to expand the electorate so it reflects the changes in our population is through registration.

July 28, 2015

2014 Census Data: The Registration and Voting Gap

Need more evidence for the need to engage the Rising American Electorate in midterm elections? Look no further than the 2014 U.S. Census data, which was released earlier this month. The numbers from the Census Bureau reinforce what other researchers found in the wake of the 2014 midterm elections—that while the Rising American Electorate had a sizeable majority of voting-eligible citizens, they cast a minority of the votes.

2012-2014-RAE-Voting

The registration and voting rates for married and unmarried women tell the same story as the RAE as a whole:

2012-2014-Women-Voting

Among both unmarried women and the larger Rising American Electorate, the number of voters registered decreased substantially between 2012 and 2014. Those results are true despite increasing populations—perhaps in part because members of the Rising American Electorate tend to relocate more often than the general public as a whole, meaning they have to re-register at their new addresses.

That’s why the Voter Participation Center works year-round to register the Rising American Electorate—particularly focusing on people who are moving, young people approaching their 18th birthday, and other voting-eligible but unregistered Americans. Learn more about the work we’re doing.

If you agree with us that our mission to register, activate, and protect the voting rights for the Rising American Electorate is crucial in 2016 and beyond, we hope you’ll consider donating to help us fulfill that mission.