Democrats the Spoiler of Youth Participation in Democratic Process

Democrats the Spoiler of Youth Participation in Democratic Process

Most nations’ history can be divided in two, a cultural history and democratic history. However, the cultural and democratic histories of the United States are deeply entwined. The culture of United States is mostly western—however, it is disingenuous to not mention the Native American Indians whose land we transformed into America—one of the most powerful and wealthy nations on planet. Some of the US’s biggest cultural and political milestones are the split and formation of two-party system in US, the Revolutionary War and formation of the United States, The Civil War, the Civil Rights movement, and the 2016 Presidential election. 

I believe that the 2016 Presidential campaign and election will prove to be one of these key milestones. It is not because of a non-political person getting into the highest office of the nation, but on youth participation and restoring their faith in democracy. Much of the youth vote was unregistered or disenfranchised of his/her right to vote.I am sure that no pundit will support me. However, who cares what pundits have to say? Every single pundit failed in predicting the 2016 election. They’re no longer credible, so ignore them. 

In the last half-century, we have had many ups and downs in participation in the democratic process. But in most cases the trend is downwards, especially with young voters. The youth participation is very important, as our nation is growing younger. Around 8% of the total population is between the ages of 18 to 29. The largest populated nations such as China and India have 7.6% and 8% between the ages of 20 to 29, respectively. And a significant portion of the population is under the age of 20,who are still ineligible to register to vote. This makes young voters an unavoidable population. In 2016, the US saw an increase in youth voter registration from previous years. However, since 1962 the trend is actually downwards. In 1964, according to US census we had more than 50% of the age group between 18-24 years participating the electoral process and 69% among the age group 25- 44 were registered voters. In 2008, with almost 50% of the total population voting, the 18-29-age block showed up in the largest numbers. I will never forget the vibe of that election: “First Black President;” an opportunity to show unity; diversity; and Hope for a better America from the worst recession in recent history.. 

 ​All that matters in an election is the voter registration and participation. For this reason, the 2016 election will be part of political history. There were 48.5 million 18-24 year-old eligible voters, in 2016, However, only 24 million youths voted in the 2016 election, meaning that over half did not participate in the election. This says a lot about our future and how Democrats spoiled it. It is simply because of the choice they forcefully imposed on voters- Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders. The youth turnout to register was because of Bernie Sanders. His rallies are the best examples to prove it. Even in Washington Square in Manhattan over 30,000 rallied for him. Hillary’s collective of rallies didn’t even come close to that number. Young people came out in droves for Sanders because he spoke about and he stood for things that matter to young people—free education, better social policies, fair taxing, woman’s empowerment, LGBTQ issues, domestic job growth. Hillary is a staunch supporter of Wall Street and established politics—things not favored by the youth vote. Moreover, almost 40% are registered as Independents rather than a Democrat or Republican which is the highest ever in our democratic history . The party affiliations are considerably out of proportion. Poll after poll showed that voter choices are not for the party elites. The administration and government failed to understand the significance of youth in the country. Most significantly they disregard the Independent registered and failed to dig into it to find the proportions of who are the new comers in the Independents.

In India, the largest democracy in the world, voter registration remains open until it is nearly Election Day. The day of the elections is a public holiday. Most OECD nations have public holidays or they conduct elections during public holidays to encourage participation. US is among the lowest voter turnout nation among all the OECD nations. Here in the US, I strongly believe that no political party wants young people to get into politics as it lessens the opportunity of political elites, vested interests, and corporations to control our system. This is known to the youth. It is wrong to point out that young people are less politically active. It have lot to do with government and our educational system, as both sectors have not put significant contribution to educate them to be active. However, elected officials rants about youth to participate and educational institutions have Political Science course, but I doubt what good they make to improve political activism. Even our campus elections have shameful results with students voter turnouts less than 5% . So, Sanders’s coming was the a real hope for them. They felt that he represented them at the age of 75. On the contrary, Democrats want their political elites to be in power. Many feared the rise of Sanders would ruin their political career. The comment of former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz said of supporting super delegates (basically party leaders), "[They] exist really to make sure that party leaders and elected officials don’t have to be in a position where they are running against grassroots activists." These comments and her hidden support of Hillary, aggravated the youth to go against her. The salt in the wound was all the covert activities the DNC participated in during the primaries. I understand there is a timeline to change voter affiliation (Oct 19th), but many young voters did not know this. This could be changed with a commonsense reform, but no party was interested. Some states with open primaries of Democratic candidates didn’t even have enough polling stations. The Democratic Party officials knew the youth was all set to come out for Sanders and they knowingly didn’t give him a fair chance. The leakage of DNC documents also proves how the media played on with Sanders. The study on media coverage on leading candidates finds that Sanders was given too little time in the media, implicating the media along with the DNC.

All this not only stopped the youth from participating the election, but also added more anger toward the system. They did not vote. On the day of election, what we saw wasn’t strange, but expected—the youth abstained from their right to vote. I would say they actually did exercise their right by not voting. Since 2004 election the registered young Republican voter turnout is consistent. In 2000 and 2004 they performed a little better and the outcome was a Republican presidency. Even in 2016,young Republican voter turnout was same as that of 2012 presidential election. However, almost 10% fewer young Democrats came out to vote in 2016 compared to 2008.   

​This almost spoiled the real hope for a better democracy. I was even stunned with former President Barack Obama, who I believe tried to convince Sanders to stay out of the race. American democracy is a pillar of global democracy. What we have done is knowingly not fix a crack in this pillar. We proved that money is key for Democratic Party. Whatever bad things Donald Trump may have said or done, he is not part of the establishment, which is what the majority of people wanted. I am not the voice for entire youth of this country, but for sure it is of atleast few. And Democrats are responsible for this. They not only elected Trump, but also sidelined the constituents of democracy.

Website links for the data 

https://www.census.gov/prod/2014pubs/p20-573.pdf

http://civicyouth.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/2016-History-Youth-Vote-Choice.jpg

https://www.census.gov/popclock/world/ca

http://www.undp.org/governance

http://ivn.us/2014/09/08/brief-history-voter-registration-united-states/

http://www.census.gov/topics/public-sector/voting/news-updates/news.html

http://civicyouth.org/an-estimated-24-million-young-people-vote-in-2016-election/

https://www.thenation.com/article/what-everyone-gets-wrong-about-independent-voters/

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/its-far-harder-to-change-parties-in-new-york-than-in-any-other-state/