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Groups Face Difficulty in Registering Young Voters During Pandemic
05 September 2020
Chase Gaines wishes he could get more young people in North Carolina to open their doors when he stops at their houses. He wants to give them information from the Republican Party.
Rick Hart desires for the days where he could campaign in the streets of Atlanta, Georgia. He wants to persuade young people to elect Democratic Party candidates.
The two college students are on the opposite sides of American politics. But they face the same difficulty: reaching young voters when universities are empty because of the new coronavirus.
Hart is a student at Morehouse College in Atlanta. He spoke1 to the Associated Press from his parent's house in Laurel, Maryland. "The country kind of came to a shut down and we were like, ‘What do we do next?'" he said.
Campaigns and their supporters say they are still struggling to answer that question and looking for solutions.
The coronavirus has forced many colleges to operate online-only classes, ending hopes of large voter registration2 drives on school campuses. Festivals, sporting events or other large public gatherings3 where young adults can be found are also canceled.
But registering college students to vote is just half the battle.
American states set their own election processes and have different policies for in-person and mail-in voting.
Students who register to vote using a university address might have their college housing close from coronavirus before they are able to vote. The move to voting by mail raises other unexpected difficulties for young voters. These include a lack of knowledge about the mail-in voting process and ballot4 rejections5 because of unclear handwriting.
"Younger voters are behind the eight ball to begin with, and COVID is just going to make it worse," said Daniel Smith. He is a political science professor at the University of Florida who has studied mail-in balloting6.
Registering young voters
The closing of campuses has a strong effect on registration of young voters in the important state of North Carolina. President Trump7, a Republican, won the state in 2016. Democratic Party nominee8 and former Vice9 President Joe Biden is hoping to win the state in the presidential election on November 3.
Kate Fellman leads the nonpartisan voter registration group You Can Vote. She said the organization set a goal this year to register 30,000 people, aged10 18 to 25, in North Carolina. She said it had registered 4,391 new voters before COVID-19 hit in mid-March. In the four months since, the group registered fewer than 100.
The problem has led to creative methods for registering young voters.
Tom Steyer, a businessman and former 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, created the group NextGen America in 2013. It has voter registration operations in 11 states. The group says it uses social media, email, online advertising11 and direct messaging to connect with young people.
The Democratic National Committee and Biden's campaign have greatly restricted employee travel, effectively ending their in-person voter contacts. That is to change said Symone Sanders, a top campaign advisor12 for Biden. She said the campaign will have its employees working campus voting drives in more than 10 battleground states by September.
Republican campaigns have been more willing to reach out to voters in person. Trump campaign spokeswoman Samantha Zager said the campaign has 73 target campuses. And, she added, more than 550 students are helping13 the campaign both on campus and online.
"Our youth engagement efforts will continue both virtually and in-person," she said.
The Center for Information & Research on Civic14 Learning and Engagement at Tufts University collects information on young voter registration. Of the 39 states for which it had dependable information, the center found that 20 states already have a higher number of young people registered to vote in August 2020 than they did in November 2016.
States like Georgia, New Jersey15, Vermont, New Mexico and California experienced increases. But states including Arkansas, Ohio, Rhode Island, South Dakota and Illinois have seen fewer registrations16.
The center noted17 that voter registration among 18 and 19-year-olds in 30 out of 39 states is currently at levels below those of 2016. And in eight of those states the drop was sharp, at 33 percent less.
I'm Jonathan Evans.
Words in This Story
campus - n. the area and buildings around a university, college, school
festival - n. an organized series of performances
behind the eight ball - phrase, at a disadvantage
nonpartisan - adj. not supporting one political party or group over another
engagement - n. the act or state of being involved with something
virtually - adv. occurring on computer or the internet
收听单词发音 |
1
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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registration
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| n.登记，注册，挂号 | |
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gatherings
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| 聚集( gathering的名词复数 )； 收集； 采集； 搜集 | |
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ballot
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| n.（不记名）投票，投票总数，投票权；vi.投票 | |
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rejections
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| 拒绝( rejection的名词复数 )； 摒弃； 剔除物； 排斥 | |
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balloting
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| v.（使）投票表决( ballot的现在分词 ) | |
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trump
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| n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭 | |
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nominee
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| n.被提名者；被任命者；被推荐者 | |
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vice
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| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
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aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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advertising
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| n.广告业；广告活动 a.广告的；广告业务的 | |
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advisor
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| n.顾问，指导老师，劝告者 | |
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helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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civic
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| adj.城市的，都市的，市民的，公民的 | |
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jersey
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| n.运动衫 | |
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registrations
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| n.登记( registration的名词复数 )；登记项目；登记（或注册、挂号）人数；（管风琴）音栓配合（法） | |
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noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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