Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

After successful Texas debut, tech-based voter registration platform goes national

After successful Texas debut, tech-based voter registration platform goes national

The founders of Register2Vote, Madeline Eden and Jeremy Smith, preparing registration information for mailing in Texas last year.

Register2Vote

Having had remarkable success at signing people up to vote in Texas last year, an Austin group of activists is expanding its pilot program into a full-blown national effort to overcome the sometimes ignored first hurdle for people in the voting process — registration.

"There are millions of voters who are registered who don't get out to vote," said Christopher Jasinski, director of partnerships for Register2Vote. "But the unmeasured part of the pie is the actual number of unregistered voters."


Register2Vote estimates that number at 11.2 million across the country. The group was created for last year's midterm campaign by Jeremy Smith, a West Point graduate and veteran Democratic operative who's helped plan several voter protection initiatives, and Madeline Eden, a software engineer and blockchain expert who lost a bid for the Democratic nomination in a central Texas congressional district last year.

In 2018, they used records from the Texas secretary of state and the U.S. Postal Service's national change of address list to target unregistered Texans. They found and then registered 166,000 of them, and in November about 112,000 (or more than 70 percent) ended up voting.

Now, the group is rolling out a national effort that has three components:

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Register2Vote: This website allows someone to check on whether they are registered. If they are not, the site will take them to another place online where they can sign up to vote.

In some states, like Texas, a paper registration form must be sent in. Register2Vote enables a person to fill out the form that will be mailed to them to sign, along with a postage-paid envelope to send the registration back to the appropriate office.

MaptheVote: This new addition to the group's efforts allows people to conduct their own personal voter registration campaigns without signing up to work for a political party or some other group.

"There are people that want to get involved because they are concerned," Jasinski said. "This provides an easy way."

Using voter registration data from each state, combined with mapping data and change of address information, this website places a green bubble at addresses where it is likely a resident is not registered. People who sign up to use the site can also add to the data in it by indicating, for example, that the gate was locked when they tried to call on the house or that there is a 17-year-old in the house who will soon be eligible to register.

Crowdfunding: Another new site can be used to invite people to donate money that will be used to send mailings targeted to those unregistered voters. Such potential voters are identified through mapping software combined with a count of how many people in a specific area — including a precinct, county or legislative district — are not registered.

Jasinski said his group hopes to provide a contrast to the constant drumbeat of negative news regarding the voting process in which people are accused of trying to make it more difficult to vote and disputes often end up in court.

"We provide a really accessible nationwide tool that anyone can find a way to be involved in," Jasinski said. And not just around elections, he said, but instead as a "consistent, everyday effort."

Read More

"Voter Here" sign outside of a polling location.

"Voter Here" sign outside of a polling location.

Getty Images, Grace Cary

Stopping the Descent Toward Banana Republic Elections

President Trump’s election-related executive order begins by pointing out practices in Canada, Sweden, Brazil, and elsewhere that outperform the U.S. But it is Trump’s order itself that really demonstrates how far we’ve fallen behind. In none of the countries mentioned, or any other major democracy in the world, would the head of government change election rules by decree, as Trump has tried to do.

Trump is the leader of a political party that will fight for control of Congress in 2026, an election sure to be close, and important to his presidency. The leader of one side in such a competition has no business unilaterally changing its rules—that’s why executive decrees changing elections only happen in tinpot dictatorships, not democracies.

Keep ReadingShow less
"Vote" pin.
Getty Images, William Whitehurst

Most Americans’ Votes Don’t Matter in Deciding Elections

New research from the Unite America Institute confirms a stark reality: Most ballots cast in American elections don’t matter in deciding the outcome. In 2024, just 14% of eligible voters cast a meaningful vote that actually influenced the outcome of a U.S. House race. For state house races, on average across all 50 states, just 13% cast meaningful votes.

“Too many Americans have no real say in their democracy,” said Unite America Executive Director Nick Troiano. “Every voter deserves a ballot that not only counts, but that truly matters. We should demand better than ‘elections in name only.’”

Keep ReadingShow less
Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump
text
Photo by Dan Dennis on Unsplash

Why America’s Elections Will Never Be the Same After Trump

Donald Trump wasted no time when he returned to the White House. Within hours, he signed over 200 executive orders, rapidly dismantling years of policy and consolidating control with the stroke of a pen. But the frenzy of reversals was only the surface. Beneath it lies a deeper, more troubling transformation: presidential elections have become all-or-nothing battles, where the victor rewrites the rules of government and the loser’s agenda is annihilated.

And it’s not just the orders. Trump’s second term has unleashed sweeping deportations, the purging of federal agencies, and a direct assault on the professional civil service. With the revival of Schedule F, regulatory rollbacks, and the targeting of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs, the federal bureaucracy is being rigged to serve partisan ideology. Backing him is a GOP-led Congress, too cowardly—or too complicit—to assert its constitutional authority.

Keep ReadingShow less
One Lesson from the Elections: Looking At Universal Voting

A roll of "voted" stickers.

Pexels, Element5 Digital

One Lesson from the Elections: Looking At Universal Voting

The analysis and parsing of learned lessons from the 2024 elections will continue for a long time. What did the campaigns do right and wrong? What policies will emerge from the new arrangements of power? What do the parties need to do for the future?

An equally important question is what lessons are there for our democratic structures and processes. One positive lesson is that voting itself was almost universally smooth and effective; we should applaud the election officials who made that happen. But, many elements of the 2024 elections are deeply challenging, from the increasingly outsized role of billionaires in the process to the onslaught of misinformation and disinformation.

Keep ReadingShow less