Red-blooded American citizens who are legally eligible to vote in this election should vote. That’s nothing you haven’t heard many times before.
Even the end zones at the NFL football games we watched this past weekend said “vote.” Earlier this year, the Kansas City Chiefs partnered with the Kansas City Royals, Sporting Kansas City and the Kansas City Current to host a city-wide voter registration drive and civic education day across three locations in both Missouri and Kansas.
We know this election could be a close one. The pollsters think it’s a toss-up, but maybe not. That seems to be about as accurate as a weather forecast based on how fuzzy the caterpillars are this year.
Pew Research tells us the elections of 2018, 2020 and 2022 were three of the highest-turnout U.S. elections of their respective types in decades. About two-thirds (66%) of the voting-eligible population turned out for the 2020 presidential election – the highest rate for any national election since 1900. The 2018 election (49% turnout) had the highest rate for a midterm since 1914. Even the 2022 election’s turnout, with a slightly lower rate of 46%, exceeded that of all midterm elections since 1970.
When Bill Clinton was elected president in 1996, only 51.7% voted – the lowest percentage since 1824, when the turnout was 26.9%, according to the U.S. Elections Project (electproject.org). John Quincy Adams was elected president on Feb. 9, 1825, after the election was decided by the House of Representatives.
Our gut feeling is that the 2024 turnout will surpass 2020 turnout. Maybe MORE than two-thirds of roughly 244 million voting-eligble population will vote; if we hit 70%, that would mean only 73.2 million Americans didn’t vote.
Does getting a sticker that says “I voted” increase turnout? It can’t hurt. Some states and counties have contests so children can design the stickers. Check out the top designs from Sedgwick County at SedgwickCounty.org.
Would making it easier to vote help? According to the League of Women Voters, in 2023, at least 322 bills restricting voting access were introduced in state legislatures nationwide.
Assuming you are eligible and able to vote, what’s stopping you?
We’ve weighed the issues and listened to the candidates and their supporters. Some of the opinions expressed sounded pretty far out. Even so, we hope more Americans will be civically engaged enough to vote. It is a right. It is a way to hold our leaders accountable. It honors those who came before us and won the right for us to vote. It is your chance to be heard – and for elected officials to know that you still expect to be heard.
