Young voters seen as key to turnout

If young voters stand up candidates at the polls Nov. 4, don’t blame the courtship.

Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain has launched McCainSpace, his version of MySpace. Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama is sending text-message updates to supporters. Facebook is plastered with get-out-the-vote messages.

The late Rev. Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University is canceling classes for its 10,500 students on Election Day and providing transportation to the polls. The Young Republicans Federation of Virginia has nearly doubled its number of chapters in the past few months.

Rock the Vote recently blew through Virginia on a three-college tour and registered 2,074 voters, while Obama’s camp has brought in several young celebrities, including two Washington Redskins team members who showed up at a high school football game in Varina to push voter registration.

Presidential races are decided by who actually turns out, so campaigns and organizations are finding ways to reach segments of the electorate, including young voters. That means descending on college campuses and targeting students hitting the books in hopes that they’ll hit the polls.

“I think it’s more effort than there’s ever been before just simply because we’ve never had two presidential candidates go after Virginia voters this way—at least in four decades,“ said Quentin Kidd, a political-science professor at Christopher Newport University.

Voters younger than 34 accounted for 62.4 percent of the 284,153 new voter registrations in Virginia between Jan. 1 and Sept. 15.

Most Virginia polls have shown a majority of younger voters leaning to Obama. For example, Obama led McCain 54 percent to 37 percent in a poll of 625 likely voters in Virginia taken Sept. 17-22. Nine percent were undecided, according to the survey by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research Inc., which had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

McCain was leading among all other age groups.

This year the campaigns’ efforts to engage younger voters are particularly intense because Virginia is a battleground state. Both campaigns are fighting for the state’s 13 electoral votes that for the past 44 years have benefited GOP presidential candidates.

The Young Republicans Federation of Virginia recently approved seven new clubs catering to voters ages 25 to 40, bringing the total to 16 statewide, according to Lori-Ann Miller, the state group’s leader. Club members are canvassing and phone-banking.

“The starts this year [have] really reflected the interest in making sure we keep it a Republican state,“ she said.

The College Republican Federation of Virginia has 25 more chapters in the state running absentee-ballot drives. Members will work the polls Nov. 4, said Sam Bradshaw, state chairman of Virginia’s College Republicans.

The Virginia Young Democrats opened offices in Fairfax Station and Virginia Beach to boost efforts before the election, according to Danny Kedem, Virginia campaign director for the Young Democrats. In addition to the offices, they have 29 chapters, with four more pending.

“In both places, we feel we have an opportunity where Democrats maybe six years ago hadn’t been so successful,“ he said. “But we feel those areas are trending our way and we can make a strong impact.“

Instead of duplicating efforts on college campuses, a focus of much attention, the Young Democrats are reaching out to young professionals in coffeeshops, bars and at concerts, Kedem said.

Virginia Commonwealth University students have grown accustomed to clipboard-wielding volunteers roaming the campus and offering voter-registration help. An MTV-spawned reality-show celebrity, Jose Tapia, visited J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College this past week for a forum with students.

High school students are studying the contest in class. The Obama camp’s Richmond office has assigned days of the week to high school students to make calls at a phone bank, and officials opened an office in Charlottesville geared to students at the University of Virginia.

“Our campaign is actively reaching out to students, relying on the same neighbor-to-neighbor, and in this case student-to-student, focus that has been the backbone of our campaign,“ said Clark Stevens, spokesman for Obama’s Virginia Campaign for Change.

Former Gov. Mark R. Warner, a Democrat who is running for the U.S. Senate, sent a letter and an absentee-ballot application to 50,000 registered voters ages 18 to 23, an age group that tends to be more mobile.

“It was an attempt to remind folks they have the opportunity to vote absentee if they are not home,“ said Jared Leopold, spokesman for the Coordinated Campaign. The letter was sent to the address where the voter is registered.

The track record of young voters actually turning out to the polls is mixed, but results from the Virginia primary could be telling.

A total of 134,968 voters ages 17 to 29 cast ballots in the state’s 2008 Democratic presidential primary, compared with 31,698 voters ages 18 to 29 who voted in the state’s 2004 Democratic primary.

In Virginia’s 2008 Republican presidential primary, 52,714 voters ages 17 to 29 cast ballots. In the previous contested GOP primary, in 2000, 66,409 voters ages 18 to 29 voted.

Christopher Newport’s Kidd said the youth vote can be fickle, noting that traditionally, many who registered did not show up on Election Day.

“If the youth vote were a marriage partner, you’d already be divorced,“ Kidd said. “The courting is hot and heavy; now the ball is in the court of the young voters.“

Contact Olympia Meola at (804) 649-6812 or .