Time Magazine: College Students Still Face Voting Stumbling Blocks

When bad press like the ABC/Stossel Interview pop up, we hit back pretty hard so that reporters think twice about partaking in biased coverage, and to shape the media narrative about young voters. We should be equally full of praise when a traditional media outlet does a good job of covering the youth vote.

In that spirit, I want to praise Laura Fitzpatrick and Time for putting together an excellent piece about the many challenges that students face in registering and getting to the polls.

College Students Still Face Voting Stumbling Blocks

It's a quadrennial issue. Every presidential election finds college students wading through a swamp of murky laws and logistical hurdles to get into the polling booths. But this year, amid record interest — and primary turnout — among college students, experts say many campus precincts are sorely unprepared to meet student demand. And laws passed after the 2004 election, ostensibly to clamp down on voter fraud, could cause a slew of new problems that disproportionately hit student voters. Which means the question in 2008 isn't will the young voters deliver. "It's can the young voters deliver?," says Matthew Segal, executive director of the Student Association for Voter Empowerment.

This is a really excellent look at the hurdles students face that the rest of the public does not, including partisan registrars willfully excluding them, lack of polling places on or near campus, youth transience, confusing and misinterpreted residency laws, and lack of proper government ID. As I've said repeatedly, lower youth turnout is about lack of access, not apathy. The piece in Time does an excellent job in fleshing out a number of those barriers to youth participation.

Also, a big shout out to Matt Segal of SAVE and Steve Fenberg of New Era Colorado, who were both quoted in the piece. Great job guys.