Election Day Registration

A recent report from the advocacy group America’s Voice highlighted the growing power of Latino voters in the upcoming 2010 elections.  Latino voters played a critical role in 2008 to propel President Obama to victory in several key swing states that previously trended Republican, including Virginia.  Latino voter registration and turnout rates have exploded over the past few years: roughly 10 million voted in the 2008 Presidential election alone, a 2.5 million increase from 2004 and 4 million person increase since 2000.  Latino voter registration grew by over 54% between 2000 and 2008, and turnout grew 64% over the same time period.  

The elections of 2008 served as a critical test of the nation's election systems.  With changes in voting machines and procedures, coupled with expectations of record voter turnout, election administrators held their breath and hoped their system wouldn't fail. 

While the system didn't fail, voters faced serious obstacles in exercising their right to vote.  Voter registration ended up being the problem that affected the largest number of voters.  Even before the first votes were cast, it was apparent that our voter registration systems were woefully inadequate.  While in other nations 90% or more of the eligible voter population is registered to vote, in the United States less than 75% of eligible voters are registered.

We can do better.

The biggest electoral dust-up this summer in Ohio has been the attempt to overturn Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner’s decision to allow voters to register and vote on the same day during a one week period from September 30th to October 6th.  This resulted from an overlap between the beginning of early voting and the end of voter registration, 30 days before the election.  The Ohio Republican Party, nervous that progressive groups planned to target get out the vote efforts during same day voting, sued in state court.  Their claim was that the practice would violate the state requirement that a person be registered 30 days before an election in order to vote.  The ACLU, in concert with a number of voting rights advocates, filed a counter-suit to enforce the Secretary of State’s decision in federal court.

Interest in the presidential election has been extremely strong throughout the primary season. As a result many states have experienced voter turnout that is significantly higher than past elections. This trend has been especially striking among young voters who have doubled and tripled their rates of participation in many states. Enabling this turnout have been a number of reforms, from early voting to election day registration to mail-in voting procedures that have encouraged wider participation.  

One of the biggest challenges in raising voter turnout is address the rate of voter registration. The vast majority of states have registration deadlines weeks before Election Day. The schedule poses problems for busy Americans who simply forget to register or re-register and find themselves unable to vote on Election Day. During the 2000 Presidential election alone, nearly 3 million voters were disenfranchised due to registration problems. Luckily, a simple solution is available: Election Day Registration (EDR).