Article by Ivey DeJesus, published on Pennsylvania Capital Star on September 4th, 2024
“Data from groups like the nonpartisan Vote.org, showed a nearly 700% increase in daily new voter registrations in the 48 hours after President Joe Biden dropped his re-election bid in July. Young voters age 18 to 34 accounted for more than 80% of those registrations, the group said.
The trend in Pennsylvania follows suit, with a dramatic shift as of July 21, the day Biden passed the torch to Vice President Kamala Harris.
“This had been the most difficult and challenging presidential election I‘ve ever worked in terms of trying to do voter registration,” said Kadida Kenner, CEO of the New Pennsylvania Project and the New Pennsylvania Project Education Fund, both non-partisan voting advocacy groups.
“Usually you don’t have enough time. You don’t have enough clipboards. This time we couldn’t get folks to register. They were disengaged. Apathetic. They were disgusted and had no interest. After July 21 it was a whole new switch.”
Overnight, voter registration saw week-over-week increases as high as 64%. The majority of new voters registered by Kenner’s organizations are under 35.
While the gender gap has been evenly split, the data on party affiliation among young people warrants note.
Of all newly registered voters statewide in August, 31% chose unaffiliated, 47 % were Democrats, while Republicans came in at 15%.”