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One in six Ohio youth are left out of voter registration drive

Young voters

Youth voters who don't have driver licenses or state IDs are left out of Ohio's youth voter registration drive.

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The Fulcrum
By The FulcrumSep 10, 2019
The Fulcrum
The Fulcrum staff.
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Ohio's campaign to boost youth voter registration, by mailing how-to postcards in August to 120,000 unregistered young adults with driver licenses or state IDs, is getting praise from voting rights activists.

But some of those advocates say the campaign has a serious flaw: Increasing numbers of young people, especially the poor and minorities, aren't getting their licenses or signing up for the IDs. At least 17 percent of Ohio's 18-year-olds don't have either, the Cleveland Plain Dealer calculated based on state records and census estimates.

The potential communications gap between the state and its young people extends to another issue involving voting: The easiest ways to update a registration is with an online form, but it's only available to people with a license or ID.

Several states offer voters online options that don't require such documents. Minnesota uses Social Security numbers to confirm IDs, for example, while Delaware and Missouri accept signatures from touch-screen devices.


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Montanans Urged To Defend Voter Integrity in November Elections

The Trump administration’s Justice Department has filed 30 lawsuits against states refusing to hand over voter rolls, which include personal information including Social Security and driver’s license numbers.

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Montanans Urged To Defend Voter Integrity in November Elections

Democracy watchdogs warned President Donald Trump is setting the stage to tap emergency powers to ensure Republicans do not lose control of Congress in November’s midterm elections.

Since January, the Trump administration has used federal law enforcement to raid election facilities to seize ballots and voting machines in places like Georgia and Puerto Rico. Trump continues to cast doubt on the integrity of elections in Montana and across the nation.

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Why are so many American elections uncontested? Richard Neal’s long tenure in Congress highlights a broader problem involving money, ballot access, parties and candidate recruitment.

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America Has an Uncontested Elections Problem

Richard Neal, the congressman representing Massachusetts’ 1st district, is concluding his 19th congressional term this year. In many ways, Neal is a typical long-tenured congressperson. However, Congressman Neal is distinguished by having been elected to Congress uncontested more times than anyone in post-civil rights American history.

Neal owes his long tenure in part to the uncompetitive elections in western Massachusetts where so-called “silent elections” are common. Some would be challengers may be put off by the fact that he has won seven of his eight contested congressional races by more than 20 points. More often than not, Neal has been uncontested in the Democratic primary as well, however, this year he has competition in both the primary and general election.

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A Democracy Cannot Run on an AI Model

Clerk Matthew Sandbar, 34, demonstrates part of the ballot-sorting process to members of the media attending a walkthrough of the Philadelphia Ballot Processing Center used to process the ballots of the 2022 US midterm elections, in Philadelphia on October 27, 2022.

Photo by Ryan Collerd / AFP via Getty Images

A Democracy Cannot Run on an AI Model

Tallying the results of Washington, DC’s first ranked-choice election in June took about 10 days—longer than many voters are used to. In an age when artificial intelligence can generate an answer in seconds, waiting days for election results can feel old-fashioned, inefficient, even suspicious. And it is about to matter far more widely. This November, 17 states, cities, and counties will use ranked-choice voting, including Maine and Alaska statewide, in races that could help decide control of Congress. More voters than ever will watch results take days to resolve, and more will be asked to trust a count they cannot see.

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Voters wait in line outside the Metropolitan Multi-Service Center to cast their ballots in Houston, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025. A recent state investigation confirmed that some registered voters flagged as potential noncitizens by a federal system had already provided proof of citizenship.

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Texas Confirms Some Flagged As Potential Noncitizens on Voter Rolls Had Provided DPS Proof of Citizenship

Election officials across the state should immediately reinstate some voters who were incorrectly flagged as potential noncitizens through a federal program, the Texas Secretary of State’s Office told county officials Wednesday.

Christina Adkins, the state elections director, told county officials the state had reviewed Texas Department of Public Safety records confirming the citizenship of some of the 2,724 registered voters who were flagged as potential noncitizens, according to an audio recording of her comments obtained by Votebeat and The Texas Tribune, as well as election officials who heard them. The voters were flagged after the state checked its voter roll through a federal program called Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, used to verify the citizenship of people registered to vote.

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