Student votes remain an important demographic for upcoming election

EAST LANSING, Mich.—The first absentee ballots of this year’s election were mailed to Michigan voters beginning on Sept. 25. The election for president between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris could be decided by only a few thousand votes in a handful of battleground states, including Michigan.  

According to 538, a data journalism news outlet that compiles polling data, the margin between the two presidential candidates is within 3% nationally and has stayed within that range since Harris entered the race in July. 

“Very close,” said Eric Juenke, an American politics professor at Michigan State University and expert in U.S. electoral institutions. “Although that doesn’t mean we won’t see a surprising Electoral College outcome one way or the other. Because so many states are so close and typically fall together at the end of the day.”

The election in the state of Michigan is even closer. Instead of Harris’ three-point lead across the country, she only has just below a two-point lead among Michiganders. 

“Close if the polls are correct,” said Juenke regarding Michigan polls. “It will probably not be as close as Pennsylvania or North Carolina or other swing states, but it will likely come down to a 1-to-3 point difference, which is still tens of thousands of votes.”

During the last two presidential elections, Michigan has been decided by only a few percentage points. In 2020, President Joe Biden won by three points, and in 2016, Trump won against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by a mere 0.2 percentage points. 

Looking even further back in Michigan’s voting history, the state has faced a nearly even split in the majority of its presidential elections. Since 1976, Michigan has voted Democratic seven times and voted Republican five times. 

In such a close election, the population of 18-to-24-year-old voters is an increasingly important demographic. Nationally, 18-to-24-year-olds make up about 10% of the total population. And in Ingham County, which encompasses most of Lansing and East Lansing, the largest demographic of people living in the county fall between the ages of 20-24 years old, nearly 20,000 people. According to recent enrollment data, about 52,000 students are enrolled at Michigan State, and roughly 40,000 of those are eligible to vote.

“Probably talking over 40 [thousand]”, said Dante Chinni, Wall Street Journal reporter and director of the American Communities Project at MSU. “I would guess there’s probably a small segment of like the freshmen class is still 17… and I guess the other group that wouldn’t be able to vote is international students, foreign students.” 

In terms of how many MSU students are registered specifically in Ingham County, that’s a more difficult number to quantify. 

“I don’t even know how you could track that”, said Chinni. “There may be a spike in registrations [closer to the election]. I assume this happens in every fall of every election.” 

Regardless, of where those 40,000 MSU students are registered to vote, it’s evident that student votes will make a large impact in November.

“You’re going to be around on this planet longer than I am most likely.” This is what Lansing City Clerk Chris Swope said when asked about the reason why MSU students should vote. “There’s so much impacting things that touch students’ lives daily. Whether it’s how expensive or affordable college is, what’s going to happen with student loan debt, and what our economy is going to look like.”

The student-population vote is so important this year, that Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson spearheaded the 2024 Michigan Campus Voting Challenge. The initiative, supported by the ALL IN organization aims to increase voter registration and turnout on campuses across the state. Many registration booths have popped up across MSU and nearby campuses in coordination with local election offices. However, according to ALL IN’s 2020 election data, only 39% of registered voters on college campuses voted in the presidential election in 2020.  

“I think this is one of the most consequential elections we’ve had in my lifetime, so I think it’s important for people to get out and have their voices be heard and participate,” said Swope.

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