High school, the Frontier for Voting Rights!

President Trump stepped to the podium on Thursday night to once again question the integrity of United States elections, once again making one thing clear, every eligible American must use their 15th amendment rights. Despite its importance, a survey for Statista finds only 43% of the 18–24 category voted in the 2024 presidential election. A deeper view into the same survey reveals a deep discrepancy among voters based on race. The survey showed white young adults voting at a 53% rate, whereas Asian, Black, and Hispanic individuals in this category voted at under a 40% rate. This problem is likely due to the lack of infrastructure that exists to encourage young adults to vote, the only existing encouragement to pre-register or register being the DMV at the conclusion of the driver's license process. This puts the onus to seek out registration on teenagers and leads to this discrepancy.

Those who tend to seek out voting tend to be those with the means and parental encouragement to do so, therefore creating this discrepancy. Another survey from Visual Capitalist shows that there may be a significant coalition between income, race, and voting. The survey displays the average white household making 21 thousand dollars more than the average Hispanic or Black household on a yearly basis. Less household income often leads to the entire household facing higher stress and a higher workload, leading to less capacity to worry about voting as well as obtaining a driver's license. Data from fair vote found that High-Income Voters (households earning $100,000 to $149,999 annually), came out to the polls at an 81% rate. In contrast, Low-Income Voters (households earning under $20,000 per year) voted around 33% of the time. This stark contrast shows how the lack of infrastructure damages impoverished and disenfranchised communities. 

Now that the discrepancy has been identified, I would like to propose a simple and effective solution: high school. Secondary education is a service enjoyed by nearly everybody from the ages of 14 to 18 and could prove to be incredibly helpful toward increasing youth voter turnout. Every high school hosting voter registration drives where students can learn about the importance of voting and register to vote will undoubtedly boost voting numbers among youth. There are even laws on the books to encourage voter registration and education in schools, such as California Education Code Section 49040(a) designating the final two weeks of April and September as High School Voter Education Weeks. Despite this, few schools participate, and even less host events to attempt to register students to vote.

If every high school decided to host voter registration drives, it would make a massive impact on election turnout. The state of Pennsylvania passed laws from 2020 to 2024 encouraging high schools to host registration drives. The initiatives were successful, as over 80% of registered teens voted in the 2024 election. If this were the case everywhere in America, there would be an estimated 12.18 million more voters. The data is clear on the efficacy of these drives; they work swimmingly. There is absolutely no reason why every high school in America should not start voter registration drives on their respective high school campuses.

References

Freedman, J. (2026, June 21). If young people won’t register to vote, how can they join the resistance? The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/21/young-people-voter-registration

Statista. (2024). Voter turnout in U.S. presidential elections by age group 1964–2020 [Data set]. https://www.statista.com

Venditti, B. (2026, June 21). Ranked: Household income by race in America. Visual Capitalist. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/ranked-household-income-by-race-in-america/ 

FairVote. (n.d.). Voter turnout. https://fairvote.org/resources/voter-turnout/?section=voter-turnout-by-state