With only a few weeks to go, November’s election is at the forefront of many people’s minds.
A majority said in a recent Pew Research Center survey that they are following election news as closely as the coronavirus pandemic, which has been the primary concern for most people in the United States over the past several months. Now, however, 75% are giving their attention to the presidential candidates and said they are “very” invested in the results.
This is atypical. People have always followed politics — but not to this extent. Indeed, another recent poll found that a record-high percentage of U.S. voters (77%) care about the outcome of this year’s election more than they did about past elections, according to Gallup. This is the highest that number has been since 1996, when only 41% of people said the election’s outcome mattered a great deal.
This enthusiasm has already yielded results. More than 22 million voters have cast early ballots in the 2020 election, which is 16% of all the votes cast in the 2016 presidential election. These early numbers suggest that the turnout rates this year could be higher than in any presidential election since 1908, according to the Associated Press.
There are several reasons for this. Voting is much more accessible than it has been in years past due to the coronavirus pandemic and its push toward mail-in voting. Moreover, the number of crises the U.S. has experienced over the past year alone has forced people to care more about politics than they may have in the past.
But on everything else, voters disagree. Registered Republicans are far less likely to think that the coronavirus pandemic is a top issue than registered Democrats, and Democrats are much more likely to care about policy debates such as climate change and race relations than Republicans. But at least one thing is certain: This election is important, and neither side is willing to let it go to waste.
