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The Texas Blue
Advancing Progressive Ideas

What Youth is Doing

Many media pundits and elders within political parties are constantly passing judgment on the youth for low voter turnout and lack of political awareness. Yet organizations like the College Democrats of America and the Young Democrats of America are working to change minds and to get young people active in the political process. In Texas, both organizations are working to get college students and young professionals involved in campaigns and to increase voter turnout among our young Democrats.

The gameplan for involving young people began in Corpus Christi. Newly elected state representative Juan Garcia hosted a Texas Young Democrats executive board meeting prior to his race. Texas Young Democrats from all over the state including people from El Paso, Austin, San Antonio, Houston, Dallas and Denton traveled to Corpus Christi to plan events for the Texas Young Democrats involvement in the November elections.

This year, the Texas Young Democrats funded two full-time internships for two State Representative campaigns. From August to November a young democrat worked on Juan Garcia's campaign in Corpus Christi and Harriet Miller's campaign in Dallas. Both campaigns were successful in their run for the Texas House thanks in part to the contributions of the Texas Young Democrats' two interns.

This election cycle, the College Democrats of Texas, a brother organization of the Texas Young Democrats, funded a Youth Coordinator for the Chris Bell campaign. Betsy Parchem, a UNT graduate, also served as an Executive Director for the College Democrats of Texas. "We recruited 26 college chapters to get involved in state politics. The highlight was the college rally for Chris Bell held at the University of Texas. There were hundreds of people in attendance," said Betsy.

The College Democrats in Austin and San Antonio helped on many of the local races for State House: Valinda Bolton, Donna Howard, Mark Strama, and Juaquin Castro. The young people were enlisted to do many campaign tasks from phone banking to block walking. In many of the races, our candidates said, "College Democrats made the difference between a win and a loss."

In the spring, the College Democrats will be working with the Texas Young Democrats to host the State Convention. At the convention, the Texas Young Democrats will have competitive races for President and Executive Board member positions. Additionally, leaders from the College Democrats will travel to Washington D.C. for the College Democrats of America Leadership Summit and the quarterly meeting of the DNC. The College Democrats and the Young Democrats are also preparing to lobby as the State Legislature convenes to discuss higher education, immigration, and women's issues. Nationally, both organizations will be working to ensure the new Democratic leadership remembers the youth in the first "100 hours legislation."

The trend in youth politics is very positive with each cycle bringing an increase in youth voting, with Democrats receiving a majority of the youth vote. November 2006 was very exciting for youth nationally with a large increase in youth voting and turnout.

Here are the Stats:
  • 24% of young people voted in the 2006 election cycle, which is a 4% increase over 2002
  • 18-29 year olds voted Democratic by a 22 point margin, the next best age groups was an 8 point advantage, continuing a trend from 2004 (18-29 year olds voted 60% Democrats and 38% Republicans versus older populations voted 51% Democrat and 47% Republican).
  • The share of the votes cast by young people (18-29) according to exit polls is up by 2 points, to 13%. This means young voters shattered turnout records. 2006 was a higher turnout election overall, and young people are actually a smaller portion of the population than in 2002, so increasing the share of the overall vote means the 2004 youth vote trend continues.

Young people went into the election voting for Democrats with a 2 to 1 margin and the majority of them identifying as Democrats for the first time in years. Without college students knocking on doors and voting, November 2006 would not have been such an exciting celebration. In key states: Tennessee, Colorado, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and New Hampshire, the College Democrats canvassed and phone banked in key Congressional districts targeted by the DCCC. The youth are working to make sure all Texans have clean air, freedom of rights, better education, and a fair system of welfare that provides a hand up, not a hand out. These are wishes every person has for the future, and the youth are working now to make sure it is a reality.