Title: Protecting the Freedom to Vote | Demos
Headings: Protecting the Freedom to Vote
Protecting the Freedom to Vote
The Voter Empowerment Act of 2012
Introduction

Content: 3 Over 146 million people were registered to vote in 2008, according to the US Census Current Population Survey. 4 So, the voting rate for people who were registered to vote was ninety percent, while the voting rate for citizens of voting age was only sixty-four percent. 5
Today, approximately 51 million eligible Americans are still not registered to vote, according to the Pew Center on the States. 6 This represents almost one in four citizens, disproportionately low-income voters, people of color, and younger Americans. 7 This suggests that a major focus for increasing citizen participation in elections should be to decrease the bureaucratic barriers to becoming registered to vote. Eligible Americans should never find themselves shut out of the system and denied the right to participate in choosing their government representatives because of bureaucratic error. Yet a Cooperative Congressional Election Study by Harvard Professor Stephen Ansolabehere reported that in the 2008 election 2 to 3 million registered voters were prevented from voting because of registration or other administrative problems, and 9 million eligible Americans were not registered because of residency rules or registration deadlines. 8 Reportedly, the number of people barred from voting in 2008 exceeded the popular vote margin of the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. 9 The study concluded that “registration continues to create significant barriers to getting into the electoral system and to voting on Election Day.” 10
Anyone can get caught up in the red tape and find their freedom to vote impinged upon.