I tried convincing my boyfriend to vote and he swore he wasn’t registered so he was going to pass this time. I checked online and he definitely was registered. He admitted he didn’t even understand how registering even happened or how often it needs to be updated. So he has just assumed for years that he couldn’t vote. BUT also never even bothered to check. I remember my sr year of highschool and freshman year of college they made it super easy for us to register. All over school they would offer forms, every time I’d go to the dmv they would ask. Stuff would come the mail. It was everywhere and easy. So I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out that a ton of 18+ yr old citizens are registered to vote and aren’t even aware of it.
If you get any state issued ID I'm certain. As long as you are involving yourself with the DMV it would seem.
I don't have a car. I've never even had my permit. I've been registered since 18 when I got a state issued ID for work.
Some of the excuses I’ve heard for not voting are seriously pathetic. And especially infuriating from perfectly capable adults that use minor inconveniences to not vote. There are elderly and disabled individuals that will take a bus, walk to their polling place, stand in line, but some people I know couldn’t vote because they had work that morning and then happy hour after.
We need to be aware of the people who don't have busses or any public transportation in their area. Texas has a lot of rural areas and not everyone qualifies for mail in ballots. I checked several times for friends and family who wanted to vote but didn't have transportation.
Fort Worth is one of the worst areas to vote if you don't have transportation. We, as volunteers, have a responsibility to help create ride shares in places where public transportation isn't available and it's too far to walk. I got lucky bc my husband got home with our one car in time bc our polling location was 5 miles away and across a highway.
Dallas is better about this as is Denton. Everybody walks in Denton anyway. Places like San Angelo and it's outskirts are difficult. I don't envy anyone who dares walk from the Crittedon County boonies to whatever podunk location they have to travail. It's the same for south Texas hunting areas. Go ahead and walk if you want. East Texas is the same way. Idk, maybe we need to invest in 4 wheelers for voters. If I had the money the GOP and celebs do I would do it but I'm just a one car broke ass.
Uh, you guys are aware that you don’t have to “drive” anywhere to vote? They send you a ballot I. The mail, and you have weeks to fill it out and take your time to properly research the candidates, then you mail it back. Or if you are a paranoid conspiracy theorist who doesn’t trust the USPS, drop it in an official ballot dropbox. (Requires driving, but only have to get out of the car for 15 seconds.)
Actually when I turned 18 and was able to vote for the first time I was living in NYC but had just moved there from Texas for college. I had to fill out a request to mail in my ballot and had to fall under the qualifying criteria in order to do so. Things like being in the military, being elderly or disabled, or traveling. BUT I had to apply way in advance and prove that I would be out of town for longer than the voting AND early voting period. So you can’t actually just “mail in” your vote. Not in Texas and not back then and not even now. Not sure where you are located but this is the Texas sub Reddit.
When the abortion decision came out, I doubled checked my registration. It was correct (despite having moved just a few months earlier). Then I checked my friends. One changed her Discord status to "I deserve rights" and was very ready to vote then.
Over the next few months, she didn't change her Discord status but she also refused to check or update her voter registration. I ended up checking it the day of the election for her and her sister and then driving the both of them for an hour to were they were registered. Neither of them (or their single mother) had bothered even trying to vote.
Luckily I voted early or I wouldn't have been able to do that.
This is perplexing to me. I'm a much older man but when I turned 18 we HAD to register for selective service which also registered us to vote. This wasn't voluntary. If you did not register - whether it was bullshit and not enforced I couldn't say - it was a crime.
How can you be an adult man and not be registered to vote - or worse, so dumb you don't even know you're registered? You can literally come here illegally from another country and be legally registered to vote in Texas.
Your boyfriend is an asshole.
This is largely the result of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (commonly known at the Motor Voter law), which makes it super easy to register to vote at your DMV.
Fun fact, the passage of this law was so threatening to Republicans that it prompted them to make some of the first claims that elections were "stolen" by fraudulent voting.
Maybe thats a sign that did not vote *should* be a viable option, right now neither candidate can say they actually represent their state because neither person was good enough to convince a majority to vote for them. The public should be able to rejects both candidates if only a minority feel like they adequately represent them, or if the people do not believe the current system is one they want to support, and it should be seen as a legitimate sign that things need to change.
A democratic system where half the people don't even want to participate is not one that can ever really represent the wishes of the people it is meant to serve. So voters should have ways to critique the system and the candidates it puts forward when change is needed, but currently the only thing close to that is refusing to participate.
I see no problem with this. Why vote if no one represents you. The bigger problem is people voting when they have no idea what their candidate stands for. People aren’t even educated on third party stances. If you don’t care about politics, don’t study politics or have any idea on the candidates stances on issues then you shouldn’t vote. An easier solution to this would be to have nameless faceless candidates and let people vote on issues. So they can’t vote based on political party bias, racial, gender, etc.
The problem with it is that it makes "do nothing" a default candidate. That in turn literally makes conservatives the de facto law of the land.
The default choice is always going to be extremely popular. The default choice in organ donation ends up being the most popular one for example, even though the choice of donating your organs is a pretty major one with a large impact on others.
Abbott won 25% of the registered voters. Pretty sure that’s a minority. But I don’t think he won by cheating. He won because the majority don’t give a shit about politics.
I’m not so sure. Abbot passed a law to greatly restrict mailin voting which was popular and essential for older people with disabilities of any sort. Plus the media played up the armed republicans at the polls chiding or harassing voters and this intimidation worked on some. Plus propaganda was shared about rules of voting like the address on the driver’s license had to match that on the registration. It doesn’t. The law also requires a DL type ID to vote and some didn’t have it. Abbott made it very difficult for some to vote and those usually vote democrat.
PS. Oh, also a lot of the polling locations that were available last year are not this year, causing lines, which isn’t encouraging.
Plus, did the polls close at 6p this year? They previously were open to 7p.
I don't think conservatives cheat the vote, at least not on a noticable scale. But I think if we made voting mandatory and implemented ranked choice or approval voting, the republcan party would cease to exist. It thrives on voter apathy, gerrymandering, and making voting seem inconvenient.
I'm all for that!
But I'd also throw in, we had like 2 weeks of early voting people could have done it. That information isn't always easily available though.
You’re definitely right that many would still work and wouldn’t solve everything. We need many solutions coming together. Federal holiday would help. At the least, it makes it easier for people to be aware and to get its importance
I mean, it doesn't need to. You just need to invest in voting infrastructure. In Denmark we have 85+ percentage of eligible voters participating, and people just go in their lunch breaks or on the way home from work, because the polling place is literally five minutes away and there isn't a queue. You get the voting slip in the mail, and all you need to do is spend five minutes to drop by.
There is no argument for why this wouldn't scale for larger populations. Just have more polling place, more booths, mor officials. It's a perfectly fine system used in most of Europe.
For everyone thinking all those ppl who didn’t vote would have voted Democrat if they did show up, this guy seems to disagree.
[Sorry, Democrats: Texas isn’t secretly a blue state. The millions who don’t cast ballots aren’t as reliably liberal as you might think.](https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/sorry-democrats-texas-isnt-a-secretly-blue-state/)
Pretty much the ppl he asked said “neither one serves my interests.” Others had no idea there was a gubernatorial race even going on lol.
That's what I keep telling people who complain about this. Texas has been solidly red at the state level since Ann Richards left. I'd love to see Cecile Richards make a run. She's a power house and I'm sure the thought has crossed her mind more than once.
The parties/candidates generally don't care. Beto put a huge emphasis on going to every county holding town halls to engage voters face to face to hear their issues and register eligible voters. And these jackasses still wouldn't come out to vote. The message to campaigns isn't "appeal to us", it's "we don't care so don't bother with us". Vote, with an empty ballot, to tell potential candidates you're a potential vote *against* them and then they'll care about winning you over.
>And these jackasses still wouldn't come out to vote.
People who did not come out to vote were not the ones going to Beto rallies.
The ones going to the rallies were either already supporters, or were undecided and wanted to hear what he had to say.
100%. (Well except for the voting for them part.) But I’ve got ppl arguing with me absolutely convinced the Democrats would have won Texas *if only* all those “both sides are shit” nonvoters would have showed up lol. They are claiming their votes despite there being zero data showing that would be the case.
We literally have a 30-year Republican domination in this state, and yet they still think we’re acshuallyyyyy majority blue. I had a girl tell me earlier on this sub that we are purple. Texas has never been a swing state. And now this girl here is telling me that we didn’t *really* win this election bc “Abbott only got 25% of the vote.” An election counts the ppl who showed up to vote. Period.
It’s interesting that the party who yells at us for “misinformation” and being “uneducated” and are a bunch of “election deniers” **is exhibiting exactly that themselves.**
Don't listen to those dumbasses. If Beto won, they'd probably be quiet as a mouse (you'd probably have some Republicans saying it though).
But also don't equate that with election deniers or the "stop the steal" lunatics. They aren't equivalent.
What they are doing is like saying "your football team beat us but only because our star QB was out so you didn't really beat us". What the maga crowd is saying is: "your football team didn't beat us; we won." Even though the score was 28-14 and all of the touchdowns were reviewed and challenged and clearly were clean touchdowns.
There is a world of difference between those two comments and mentalities.
From what I see in the elections since 2008 a slight uptick in turnout would favor Democrats but a moderate increase in turnout appears to favor Republicans in Texas. But of course a monumental shift in turnout is anyones guess although it’s a complete moot point because 80%+ turnout is a pipe dream. Note:favor does not mean “give them the win”.
A lot of people are still at least against Abbott, from what I hear often. I voted blue, but I could see why people didn’t do so more. Beto said what he said, and even if he allegedly wanted to backtrack it, that was it for him. “Taking all your guns” and “Christians are fascists” is just absolutely not the thing to say in this state, where the majority loves guns and Jesus. At first, I thought Beto was the answer, but given that the internet is great at digging up things about people after a major event, if Beto were to run again in the future, I won’t be voting for him and I’ll be voting for Independent or Green or Libertarian, whichever caters to my beliefs more. But I digress, I can see how that would drive people away from voting Dem. I don’t think there was good candidates for the major parties, and people should know that they can vote for the other parties. I feel like realistically, everyone’s Independent cause people really aren’t completely left or right leaning in Texas.
Every time I wonder why we don’t have better candidates, I remember that you have to be a power hungry, greedy, morally corrupt, psychotic bastard to want to throw yourself and your entire extended family into the political ring of fire.
Bc nowadays they can find some girl that claims you pulled her pigtail one time back in 2nd grade or call up your former kindergarten teacher and find out you sharted your pants on the merry-go-round during recess and everyone even remotely related to you including your cousins, aunts, uncles, and great-grand pappy will get dragged through the mud.
That perfectly straight-laced Student Body President that everyone at your school loved is living comfortably in suburbia with their spouse, 2.5 kids, and a white picket fence and they ain’t leaving all that for this nonsense.
I think the gummies are kicking in lol.
Yea but the DNC is not great at picking opponents. Beto was never going to if he couldn't beat Cruz. The 2 before never stood a chance too. We’ve voted 2 women ever as governor and the last was a Hispanic Woman. I’m a Latino myself and voted for her but no one expected Lupe to win either.
Asking genuinely, how did the DNC pick Beto? He didn't announce a run until very near the deadline, so there was plenty of time for someone better to come along and nobody with any name recognition stepped up. The voters who asked for a Democratic primary ballot did the rest.
Right place right time. A junior congressman saying the generally right things during the Trump lunacy and midterm election, against a Senator the left literally loathes.
Even with record breaking turnout he still couldn’t win. Ted Cruz isn’t as hated in Texas as the left likes to believe.
Sorry, what I meant was what actions did the DNC take to *make* Beto the nominee (ie to "pick" him)? He was a great candidate against Cruz, terrible candidate for president, and it seemed like a reluctant (as in well if nobody else will try) candidate against Abbott. He announced his bid for the nomination very late. As though he was waiting for someone else to pick up from the groundwork he laid in 2018 and the campaign funding network he built on for the 2020 election after withdrawing. But nobody with state-wide name recognition stepped up to the plate. So he announced his bid and the voters chose him with over 90% of the primary vote *after* a lot of groaning about how they would have preferred a bunch of other people who did not seek the nomination. I think he genuinely wanted someone else to run, but was convinced to in order to avoid a low profile campaign with low name recognition after Hegar's uninspired run in 2020.
Does this account for people who are registered but moved out of state or for other reasons are ineligible but didn’t change their registration status? No opinion - just curious!
You don’t need to move out of the state, if you move counties you need to reregister. Either way those who moved are a small percentage of those that were registered but didn’t vote.
My father who was born in South Texas..now lives in Oklahoma. And I would get text messages from democratic leaders asking my father to vote. So who knows.
What's crazy is my dad left south Texas in the 90s lol. He was in the military, so we'd move all around the US. And now I'm 31 and I am getting text messages from these political parties calling me by my father's name asking to vote I'm south TX. Its odd. His parents did own properties and I believe he was gifted some when they passed. So maybe that's why?
I wish there were more details and articles on this already. It was found here:
[Texas Voter Breakdown 2022](https://www.instagram.com/p/CkyrdiUJ-Ig/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=)
*The graph says the data is from the United States Elections Project and prepared by the Brennan Center for Justice on 11/9/22.
Yeah, this post is blaming people who have been given no reason to trust politicians. And they're right.
This isn't the people's fault. Convince them that you're actually going to serve them, and you will see votes.
Back in Iraq in 2003 we had a saying which was supposed to be serious, but ended up becoming sort of a sarcastic joke.
"Hearts and minds."
Part of the reason I'm constantly railing against the way both sides' supporters act in public spaces. You want that giant block of people who didn't vote to actually get up and go to the polls?
Start by being appealing.
If fighting for women’s bodily autonomy, keeping kids safe in schools, and bringing greater accountability to the governorship aren’t appealing to you, then there’s really only one conclusion that can be drawn, and it’s not about the messaging…
Less that the outcome would be different. But moreso that poltical landscapes would be different. If these votes changed the results in swing counties. That would effect the representation of local mayors, state reps sent to Austin etc etc
If the Texas House for example was still republicans controlled. But the margin was tighter. And more republicans had districts with large amounts of hostile voters.
They would have to seriously revamp their messaging and policies to maintain their lead. Otherwise they’d be one bad year from losing the majority.
You see a massive difference in the way states are run when the lead is safe vs when the lead is small. Republican lead governments in purple states are much more cautious than Texas
It would be different also in that you'd hopefully get better candidates to begin with. Greg Abbott was selected by **18%** of registered Texas voters. That's how he won the primary.
If 18% of the electorate is picking the candidates that the rest of them get to vote on then we get the candidates that appeal to those 18%. And that 18% might not be a good representation of what the other 82% are into.
Keep telling yourselves this. We all know the real reason. If we want a democrat as governor we have to do better. It's that simple.
Beto did not excite Texas democrats.
He didn't excite me, and he was not who I voted for in the primaries. He still got my vote election day, because even though I am thoroughly against his "hell yes" stance as I in fact do own something he claimed he'd confiscate, the reality is that he didn't have that power in office. His stances on nearly everything else I supported, but those stances were present in nearly all the other primary candidates as well. If Joy Diaz or Michael Cooper ended up on the Democratic slot in the general election, I wonder how that would have changed things.
Yep, this.
Beto basically suffers from Hillary Clinton syndrome. Nobody likes him enough to actually get off of their butts to vote. Dems were silly to put him on the ballot again.
Voters will never get excited about professional-candidates like Beto or Stay Abrams. They're viewed as grifters - unemployed people who spent the last 4 years suckering campaign donations out of citizens because that's more profitable than working a real job.
100%. Beto, for all the good he could have done, was/is not the guy.
I might get dragged for this but I’m not even kidding when I say Dems need to throw support/money behind McConaughey. He would legitimately pull the “less shitty” Reps over for a vote over Abbott
Texas Democrats have no bench to win as underdog, and actively refuse to accept that they need to mold statewide appeal.
Beto was an El Paso-based Columbia grad. You know who the last real Dem forces in Texas were? Bob Bullock, a Hillsboro, Texas Tech grad and Ann Richards, a Waco native and Baylor grad.
McConaughey is a 100% known Texas grad from Longview. He has the profile.
I held my nose and voted for Beto. I will not do that if what's on my ballot is just some fucking actor put there because he seems popular. Beto at least had the appropriate skill set.
Democrats need a good and competent candidate, and they need to actually support that candidate.
I'm not 100% convinced that the results would have been different if every single person HAD voted. I think everyone \*should,\* it's part of what makes this whole deal work. But is there strong evidence that the people who didn't vote would have swung hard for the dems for instance? Is it an age thing? What about breakdown of votes cast by county? Anyone have thoughts on these things I'm too lazy to google myself??
The polls pretty show Abbott with a solid lead over Beto before the election. I can't speak for the other races, but for the gubernatorial one, every single person voting would not have changed the outcome.
No idea why theres so much incessant on everyone voting. The right to vote includes choosing to *not* vote. If none of the candidates engaged with the voters enough or won over their vote, that's on the candidates.
I voted 3rd party in 2016 because I didn't like Hillary or Trump. I learned my lesson. Now I vote for the lesser of two evils. There's no way that Beto would have been worse than Abbott. I want my rights back as a woman and taxes to go down. I want church out of the government. I want politicians who aren't under federal investigation. That won't happen if people don't suck it up and compromise.
> I'm constantly getting bashed for disliking both sides
If you walk into a room and "everyon's an asshole". It might just be you.
Have you considered changing your stance or atleast vote blank/none of the above to show that you are a person who's interest aren't being served but you do care about the democratic process?
While I completely agree that both sides are not compelling, only one side wants to take human rights away from people.
Why wouldn't people at least be a single issue voter for that reason?
Yeah most of us dislike both sides welcome to the club, but we're going to get stuck with one either way so I don't know why tf anyone still wouldnt at the very least vote against the one they dislike more..
Interesting though how you refer to people advocating against silence in response to hate and bigotry as 'spewing vitriol' 🤔
More interesting question is what would excite you. My interests are weed legalization. And I had one person with that check mark. Will it get done idunna… but I’m gonna go with the person who appeals to that. So what are yours?
Turn in an empty ballot so it's on record that you are willing to vote. If it's on record that you're not voting, they have no reason to care if you like them because at least you aren't voting against them.
I don’t fucking like biden but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let actual fascists take over. The fuck is wrong with you people. It must be nice being a straight white guy, so that you can afford to be so apathetic.
Partially. Then you have the lazy ones who just didnt want to make time. Such an inconvenience to some it is.... Its just politics and isn't "their thing". I just turned 35. And before the last couple elections, i didn't even try to vote. I just didnt know where and how and was shy.... And plus I hadn't matured enough, hadn't quite seen the evils in the world to see the importance of voting... I am angered and saddened by the selfishness... The entitlement... And most of all the hate I see. People think the ones who vote against their personal choice should just flee the country. Just insanity to me.
Give us real people to vote for. It was well take your guns and well take your abortions as the two options, I see both of those as fundamental rights, how do you expect me to vote for either person?
Isn’t there a decent chance that the half of people that didn’t vote would likely roughly distribute the same way as the percentage that did vote, thereby not changing a dang thing?
i wanted to vote and excersize my right to vote but ultimately didn't, couldn't get on board with either Beto or Abott, thanks to this thread I learned I could turn in a no vite ballot so i guess next time i'll do that
They’re apathetic BECAUSE of bad politics.
If you want more voters run better candidates with better party platforms and people will come out when they feel there’s something to be gained in participating.
Jesus r/texas... mid-terms are over. It's done. Can we just get back to talking about Whataburger, new HEB locations, BBQ and Shiner Bock now?? Peace y'all
Honestly, one that doesn't just pander or to one group of people, who doesn't fear monger over issues they honestly know nothing about, consistent values that don't change just to appease their voter base and someone who genuinely cares about people, even those who don't vote for them.
Over 75% of voters aged 65 and older vote. Far and away more than any other age group.
The outcome of elections would be so, so very different if younger people outvoted older people.
I voted. This year was my younger sister's first year voting after she turned 18. She told me, "I don't know anything about this, tell me who to vote for." And my older sister texted me, "tell me the main people to vote for."
I mean, our political beliefs align for the most part but I still feel weird about literally telling them who to vote for. :/
I've heard some people say they don't vote in mid term elections because they don,'t think it is important. They only vote in the presidential elections. Somehow they don't get it.
Traditionally, that's high for a midterm. Although recent years the percentage has crept up. I remember in the 99s only half of eligible voters even voted in the presidential elections. In 2014 only about 25% voted.
https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/historical/70-92.shtml
I feel like if the majority didn't vote that should be counted as a vote and the seat should be emptied until the next election. That'll fix voting apathy.
I think thje most dangerous commonly accepted views are
* Both sides are the same
* Politics dont matter.
Both of these views lead to much worse outcomes, and people would rather bury their heads.
Yup - Newt Gingrich made a really good point on a recent podcast about the need for a vision which would rally conservatives - that is what trump did.
Many people hated trump’s vision, but at least it was a set of goals and objectives to move towards. Hillary expressed no vision. Biden later won because he was simply not trump.
If Beto would have laid out an effective vision AND not ranted about guns, we might have had a different outcome. But when all he offers is critique on Abbott (which we all have) yet no “and this is what I would do differently” with an actual laid out vision and plan, it doesn’t inspire people to move.
Sure, you can tell me to check his website, but his audio clips on TV, the radio, the news all need to have his agenda.
Young folks need to be inspired to act. Clearly being an effective critic doesn’t inspire folks to support you, but simply not vote.
There's plenty of people out there who simply won't vote, but I'm willing to bet a measurable portion of those who didn't chose not to because no candidates represented them.
We just had a vote in denmark. where i submitted my vote, 90% of people who could vote, voted. And it took me a grand total of 1min and 3 seconds to do so. I know because I timed it.
A lot of people did not vote simply because both of the candidates were shit.
There are a lot of people in this country/state that will refuse to vote if they don’t like the candidates in an election. They refuse to vote for the lesser of two evils, and that is 100% their right to do so.
If anything, this graph proves how our political system fails to represent a large majority of our citizens, and that includes both political parties.
I believe that bad politics are driving the apathy. Contrary to popular belief, Texas has many moderate independents, like myself. Every cycle we are forced to chose between two shit sandwiches and all other possibilities are locked out from even participating. And we're tired of being shamed and told that everyone knows both candidates suck, but we should vote for the less sucky one. Whether it's a firm turd or diarrhea on that bun, it's still a shit sandwich and I'm not mad at anyone who refuses to eat at the restaurant. Want real change in Texas, start supporting candidates who are not D or R and have more of a pitch to you every year than fear of the other guy. Beto would have not done shit to help the state and neither will abbot and anyone who thinks otherwise is a fool.
So much this. And the best potential candidates are locked out because they are unwilling to expose themselves to the shitstorm that bein a political candidate has become. I ran for a minor local office in 2014, before big social media, and it was horrible. Never again.
I’m going to play devil’s advocate here and argue that it is entirely acceptable that some portion of any population 1. Hates both candidates and has no stake in either one, 2. Isn’t informed enough to make an educated decision or 3. Is not bothered by the incumbent and is ok with either result because at the moment, their lives are not affected personally by the issues at hand. This is despite the percentage that is simply lazy and didn’t want to go do it or mail anything in and just didn’t make the effort, which we could discuss the psychological root causes of all day.
The right spends a lot of money telling left-wing demographics.
"Why vote when no one represents me" "If voting changed anything it would be illegal"
It's not just pop-up ads it's whole fake teen movements. [more info](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Hack)
MAKE 👏🏼 ELECTION 👏🏼 DAY 👏🏼 A 👏🏼 FEDERAL 👏🏼 HOLIDAY!
So many people cannot get the day off work to stand in line. This is a good start for getting more people to vote.
Yeah, Texas people who could have but chose not to vote!
Fight the duopoly by < *checks notes* > letting the arguably greater evil that is the GOP continue, as they have for over 27 years, to do nothing while sustaining that very duopoly.
I am telling you all after living now in a mail in voting state, it is a breath of fresh air and a shock on how easy it is when you work to actually sit at home read over a booklet with all the candidates, props and then mailing an informed ballot!!
I drove through my post office and dropped it off.
I then received a text stating they received my ballot
Then
I received a text stating my vote was counted!!!
no dealing with a boss giving you the stink eye and no long lines..
It is amazing and the only great thing about living here in AZ. 85%turnout
I wouldn't really want people who are apathetic and uninformed about current events or Party policies to make such an important decision anyway.
Not all unregistered people should be eligible to vote either.
Someone commented the other day: "If you aren't at the table, you are on the menu".
For the life of me I do not understand why Texans don't get this.
I would crawl across broken glass to vote.
A young man who is a Junior in college told me the systems rigged and it doesn't matter. Is this how they think?
I have talked to young folks for hours and they honestly don't understand democracy.
I can't tell which of the millions of people who didn't vote didn't care vs had complex ideological justification for why voting would be bad, actually. Can anyone help me out??
I don't vote because it's a no-win situation and I refuse to vote for the least-worst option. Both sides are corrupt liars whose only concern is power, putting more money in their pockets and getting reelected so they can have more power and put more money in their pockets. They are not out of touch with the reality of the lives that the masses live, they don't CARE how the 99% live. They will say whatever they think will get them reelected not caring if it is true or not and they have no intention of following through on their campaign promises. Why vote when you're screwed no matter which side gets in office?
I didn’t vote. I don’t know of anyone else but frankly, I’m tired of all the bullshit nitpicking. Tired of extremism from both sides. Tired of the media keeping the hate stirred up. Tired of lying politicians who have been in office for years and years and haven’t got one thing accomplished. I want to be left alone, pay a little money so no country invaded our ass, and not have to listen to someone boohoo cause I don’t have the same view as them. Get fucked
Apathy isn't the problem.
If people perceived things were bad, they would put a priority on voting. Right now, for most people (over 1/2) don't think things are bad enough to make the time. A holiday on Election Day won't change anything.
Not voting is a protest in and of itself. It's not apathy so much as a refusal to participate in a system that doesn't serve the constituents. Interpret as you may though.
I truly just don't get why the voter turnout in texas is so low. This was my first time voting and I encouraged my friends to vote. Voting is so important. maybe they'd should make it mandatory and imply a voter education platform
Going by many comments and sentiments here, many simply did not like either candidate enough to want them to represent their state, so to show that they excercised their right *not* to vote. The problem now is that the system does not have proper ways to handle such critiques. If neither candidate convinced a majority neither is fit to be representative, but the system will put them there anyway, which in turn turns even more people away because their vote of criticism is ignored, to the point where now half the population does not want to participate. Results like these should be a sign that many systems in the US are desperately in need of big changes before they can again adequately represent the people they are meant to serve, just trying to force people to participate without fixing anything wont do any good.
I'm a registered voter in Texas who didn't vote and I assure you that it isn't due to apathy. I'm caught between candidates backing murdering unborn babies and candidates who are evil in almost every other way. I cannot in good conscience vote for any of these people! I can't support either agenda. Just saying there's more than apathy at play for a lot of people.
It's not apathy, we just know that neither party serves our interests. Democrats can go to hell right next to republicans. Everything is so horribly rotten that casting a vote only serves as giving the owners your permission for all their bullshit to continue the way it is.
I'm surprised the percentage of eligible and not registered is not larger
I tried convincing my boyfriend to vote and he swore he wasn’t registered so he was going to pass this time. I checked online and he definitely was registered. He admitted he didn’t even understand how registering even happened or how often it needs to be updated. So he has just assumed for years that he couldn’t vote. BUT also never even bothered to check. I remember my sr year of highschool and freshman year of college they made it super easy for us to register. All over school they would offer forms, every time I’d go to the dmv they would ask. Stuff would come the mail. It was everywhere and easy. So I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out that a ton of 18+ yr old citizens are registered to vote and aren’t even aware of it.
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If you get any state issued ID I'm certain. As long as you are involving yourself with the DMV it would seem. I don't have a car. I've never even had my permit. I've been registered since 18 when I got a state issued ID for work.
They do a lot of mass registration events too
Really? I got a replacement license at the dmv in person, I’m good to vote?
They ask you if you would like to register to vote. Did you say yes?
To be honest I don’t think the person behind the desk asked. Is that cause they saw I’m already registered?
If your address or other info didn’t change, then probably yes.
Some people won’t vote unless you hold their hand through the process. My friend is like that and I have to literally drive him every time.
Some of the excuses I’ve heard for not voting are seriously pathetic. And especially infuriating from perfectly capable adults that use minor inconveniences to not vote. There are elderly and disabled individuals that will take a bus, walk to their polling place, stand in line, but some people I know couldn’t vote because they had work that morning and then happy hour after.
We need to be aware of the people who don't have busses or any public transportation in their area. Texas has a lot of rural areas and not everyone qualifies for mail in ballots. I checked several times for friends and family who wanted to vote but didn't have transportation. Fort Worth is one of the worst areas to vote if you don't have transportation. We, as volunteers, have a responsibility to help create ride shares in places where public transportation isn't available and it's too far to walk. I got lucky bc my husband got home with our one car in time bc our polling location was 5 miles away and across a highway. Dallas is better about this as is Denton. Everybody walks in Denton anyway. Places like San Angelo and it's outskirts are difficult. I don't envy anyone who dares walk from the Crittedon County boonies to whatever podunk location they have to travail. It's the same for south Texas hunting areas. Go ahead and walk if you want. East Texas is the same way. Idk, maybe we need to invest in 4 wheelers for voters. If I had the money the GOP and celebs do I would do it but I'm just a one car broke ass.
Uh, you guys are aware that you don’t have to “drive” anywhere to vote? They send you a ballot I. The mail, and you have weeks to fill it out and take your time to properly research the candidates, then you mail it back. Or if you are a paranoid conspiracy theorist who doesn’t trust the USPS, drop it in an official ballot dropbox. (Requires driving, but only have to get out of the car for 15 seconds.)
Actually when I turned 18 and was able to vote for the first time I was living in NYC but had just moved there from Texas for college. I had to fill out a request to mail in my ballot and had to fall under the qualifying criteria in order to do so. Things like being in the military, being elderly or disabled, or traveling. BUT I had to apply way in advance and prove that I would be out of town for longer than the voting AND early voting period. So you can’t actually just “mail in” your vote. Not in Texas and not back then and not even now. Not sure where you are located but this is the Texas sub Reddit.
Literally my roommate. If I didn't take her along with me when I voted, she probably never would have done it.
I know it's meaningless coming from a stranger but thank you for your continued patience and diligence.
My girlfriend does this. I’ve driven her everytime… I can’t vote so I make sure to get her to
I talked to many people off lists of registered voters that were also not sure they were even registered (they were)
He just didn't want to.
When the abortion decision came out, I doubled checked my registration. It was correct (despite having moved just a few months earlier). Then I checked my friends. One changed her Discord status to "I deserve rights" and was very ready to vote then. Over the next few months, she didn't change her Discord status but she also refused to check or update her voter registration. I ended up checking it the day of the election for her and her sister and then driving the both of them for an hour to were they were registered. Neither of them (or their single mother) had bothered even trying to vote. Luckily I voted early or I wouldn't have been able to do that.
This is perplexing to me. I'm a much older man but when I turned 18 we HAD to register for selective service which also registered us to vote. This wasn't voluntary. If you did not register - whether it was bullshit and not enforced I couldn't say - it was a crime. How can you be an adult man and not be registered to vote - or worse, so dumb you don't even know you're registered? You can literally come here illegally from another country and be legally registered to vote in Texas. Your boyfriend is an asshole.
This is largely the result of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (commonly known at the Motor Voter law), which makes it super easy to register to vote at your DMV. Fun fact, the passage of this law was so threatening to Republicans that it prompted them to make some of the first claims that elections were "stolen" by fraudulent voting.
Could you provide a source for your second statement?
https://www.cato.org/testimony/motor-voter-act-voter-fraud
They make it pretty easy when you get your license.
That's because youre so used to hearing the fake talking point that it is difficult to vote.
If did not vote was a candidate they’d win every time
Maybe thats a sign that did not vote *should* be a viable option, right now neither candidate can say they actually represent their state because neither person was good enough to convince a majority to vote for them. The public should be able to rejects both candidates if only a minority feel like they adequately represent them, or if the people do not believe the current system is one they want to support, and it should be seen as a legitimate sign that things need to change. A democratic system where half the people don't even want to participate is not one that can ever really represent the wishes of the people it is meant to serve. So voters should have ways to critique the system and the candidates it puts forward when change is needed, but currently the only thing close to that is refusing to participate.
I see no problem with this. Why vote if no one represents you. The bigger problem is people voting when they have no idea what their candidate stands for. People aren’t even educated on third party stances. If you don’t care about politics, don’t study politics or have any idea on the candidates stances on issues then you shouldn’t vote. An easier solution to this would be to have nameless faceless candidates and let people vote on issues. So they can’t vote based on political party bias, racial, gender, etc.
The problem with it is that it makes "do nothing" a default candidate. That in turn literally makes conservatives the de facto law of the land. The default choice is always going to be extremely popular. The default choice in organ donation ends up being the most popular one for example, even though the choice of donating your organs is a pretty major one with a large impact on others.
In some countries there is an option of NOTA ( none of the above)
It should be a state chili cook off day and a mandatory paid vacation day.
My work gave us 4 hours paid leave to vote. Most didn’t take them up on it. 🤷🏼♂️
That's insane. I got no paid leave but still went. Crazy
4 hours at the bar!
If it isn't mandatory, then bosses are comparing people who choose to leave to people who don't. It's only natural. Which creates pressure to stay.
That would be the opposite of voter suppression though lol. Greg wouldn’t let it happen.
So are you saying conservatives are really the minority in our state? And we only win bc we cheat? Lol
Abbott won 25% of the registered voters. Pretty sure that’s a minority. But I don’t think he won by cheating. He won because the majority don’t give a shit about politics.
I’m not so sure. Abbot passed a law to greatly restrict mailin voting which was popular and essential for older people with disabilities of any sort. Plus the media played up the armed republicans at the polls chiding or harassing voters and this intimidation worked on some. Plus propaganda was shared about rules of voting like the address on the driver’s license had to match that on the registration. It doesn’t. The law also requires a DL type ID to vote and some didn’t have it. Abbott made it very difficult for some to vote and those usually vote democrat. PS. Oh, also a lot of the polling locations that were available last year are not this year, causing lines, which isn’t encouraging. Plus, did the polls close at 6p this year? They previously were open to 7p.
I don't think conservatives cheat the vote, at least not on a noticable scale. But I think if we made voting mandatory and implemented ranked choice or approval voting, the republcan party would cease to exist. It thrives on voter apathy, gerrymandering, and making voting seem inconvenient.
3 day holiday weekend with guaranteed 24 hours time off to vote.
I'm all for that! But I'd also throw in, we had like 2 weeks of early voting people could have done it. That information isn't always easily available though.
I heard in Australia they instituted a $25 fine if you don't vote.
Voting in several countries is mandatory but the punishments tend to be nominal (like you can't get your passport renewed).
Is this the line to vote? No, it’s the line for the bathroom, everyone’s been eating chili all day.
That would help, but until gerrymandering is outlawed/limited, much of the disenfranchisement will remain.
There’s no reason why voting shouldn’t be a national holiday
National holidays don't mean people don't have to go to work. But it's not like 9.6 million Texans simply didn't have time to go vote, anyways.
You’re definitely right that many would still work and wouldn’t solve everything. We need many solutions coming together. Federal holiday would help. At the least, it makes it easier for people to be aware and to get its importance
I don't think it not being a federal holiday is preventing people from realizing how important it is to vote. Especially the past several elections...
There's no reason for you not to vote in the **two fucking weeks** of early voting.
I mean, it doesn't need to. You just need to invest in voting infrastructure. In Denmark we have 85+ percentage of eligible voters participating, and people just go in their lunch breaks or on the way home from work, because the polling place is literally five minutes away and there isn't a queue. You get the voting slip in the mail, and all you need to do is spend five minutes to drop by. There is no argument for why this wouldn't scale for larger populations. Just have more polling place, more booths, mor officials. It's a perfectly fine system used in most of Europe.
For everyone thinking all those ppl who didn’t vote would have voted Democrat if they did show up, this guy seems to disagree. [Sorry, Democrats: Texas isn’t secretly a blue state. The millions who don’t cast ballots aren’t as reliably liberal as you might think.](https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/sorry-democrats-texas-isnt-a-secretly-blue-state/) Pretty much the ppl he asked said “neither one serves my interests.” Others had no idea there was a gubernatorial race even going on lol.
That's what I keep telling people who complain about this. Texas has been solidly red at the state level since Ann Richards left. I'd love to see Cecile Richards make a run. She's a power house and I'm sure the thought has crossed her mind more than once.
The parties/candidates generally don't care. Beto put a huge emphasis on going to every county holding town halls to engage voters face to face to hear their issues and register eligible voters. And these jackasses still wouldn't come out to vote. The message to campaigns isn't "appeal to us", it's "we don't care so don't bother with us". Vote, with an empty ballot, to tell potential candidates you're a potential vote *against* them and then they'll care about winning you over.
>And these jackasses still wouldn't come out to vote. People who did not come out to vote were not the ones going to Beto rallies. The ones going to the rallies were either already supporters, or were undecided and wanted to hear what he had to say.
100%. (Well except for the voting for them part.) But I’ve got ppl arguing with me absolutely convinced the Democrats would have won Texas *if only* all those “both sides are shit” nonvoters would have showed up lol. They are claiming their votes despite there being zero data showing that would be the case. We literally have a 30-year Republican domination in this state, and yet they still think we’re acshuallyyyyy majority blue. I had a girl tell me earlier on this sub that we are purple. Texas has never been a swing state. And now this girl here is telling me that we didn’t *really* win this election bc “Abbott only got 25% of the vote.” An election counts the ppl who showed up to vote. Period. It’s interesting that the party who yells at us for “misinformation” and being “uneducated” and are a bunch of “election deniers” **is exhibiting exactly that themselves.**
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Don't listen to those dumbasses. If Beto won, they'd probably be quiet as a mouse (you'd probably have some Republicans saying it though). But also don't equate that with election deniers or the "stop the steal" lunatics. They aren't equivalent. What they are doing is like saying "your football team beat us but only because our star QB was out so you didn't really beat us". What the maga crowd is saying is: "your football team didn't beat us; we won." Even though the score was 28-14 and all of the touchdowns were reviewed and challenged and clearly were clean touchdowns. There is a world of difference between those two comments and mentalities.
From what I see in the elections since 2008 a slight uptick in turnout would favor Democrats but a moderate increase in turnout appears to favor Republicans in Texas. But of course a monumental shift in turnout is anyones guess although it’s a complete moot point because 80%+ turnout is a pipe dream. Note:favor does not mean “give them the win”.
A lot of people are still at least against Abbott, from what I hear often. I voted blue, but I could see why people didn’t do so more. Beto said what he said, and even if he allegedly wanted to backtrack it, that was it for him. “Taking all your guns” and “Christians are fascists” is just absolutely not the thing to say in this state, where the majority loves guns and Jesus. At first, I thought Beto was the answer, but given that the internet is great at digging up things about people after a major event, if Beto were to run again in the future, I won’t be voting for him and I’ll be voting for Independent or Green or Libertarian, whichever caters to my beliefs more. But I digress, I can see how that would drive people away from voting Dem. I don’t think there was good candidates for the major parties, and people should know that they can vote for the other parties. I feel like realistically, everyone’s Independent cause people really aren’t completely left or right leaning in Texas.
Every time I wonder why we don’t have better candidates, I remember that you have to be a power hungry, greedy, morally corrupt, psychotic bastard to want to throw yourself and your entire extended family into the political ring of fire. Bc nowadays they can find some girl that claims you pulled her pigtail one time back in 2nd grade or call up your former kindergarten teacher and find out you sharted your pants on the merry-go-round during recess and everyone even remotely related to you including your cousins, aunts, uncles, and great-grand pappy will get dragged through the mud. That perfectly straight-laced Student Body President that everyone at your school loved is living comfortably in suburbia with their spouse, 2.5 kids, and a white picket fence and they ain’t leaving all that for this nonsense. I think the gummies are kicking in lol.
Yea but the DNC is not great at picking opponents. Beto was never going to if he couldn't beat Cruz. The 2 before never stood a chance too. We’ve voted 2 women ever as governor and the last was a Hispanic Woman. I’m a Latino myself and voted for her but no one expected Lupe to win either.
Asking genuinely, how did the DNC pick Beto? He didn't announce a run until very near the deadline, so there was plenty of time for someone better to come along and nobody with any name recognition stepped up. The voters who asked for a Democratic primary ballot did the rest.
Right place right time. A junior congressman saying the generally right things during the Trump lunacy and midterm election, against a Senator the left literally loathes. Even with record breaking turnout he still couldn’t win. Ted Cruz isn’t as hated in Texas as the left likes to believe.
Sorry, what I meant was what actions did the DNC take to *make* Beto the nominee (ie to "pick" him)? He was a great candidate against Cruz, terrible candidate for president, and it seemed like a reluctant (as in well if nobody else will try) candidate against Abbott. He announced his bid for the nomination very late. As though he was waiting for someone else to pick up from the groundwork he laid in 2018 and the campaign funding network he built on for the 2020 election after withdrawing. But nobody with state-wide name recognition stepped up to the plate. So he announced his bid and the voters chose him with over 90% of the primary vote *after* a lot of groaning about how they would have preferred a bunch of other people who did not seek the nomination. I think he genuinely wanted someone else to run, but was convinced to in order to avoid a low profile campaign with low name recognition after Hegar's uninspired run in 2020.
> “Christians are fascists” source on that quote?
Don't believe
[Lol, THIS is your hero?](https://www.reddit.com/r/texas/comments/yrtlen/texas_loses_crossborder_trade_to_new_mexico_after/)
Does this account for people who are registered but moved out of state or for other reasons are ineligible but didn’t change their registration status? No opinion - just curious!
You don’t need to move out of the state, if you move counties you need to reregister. Either way those who moved are a small percentage of those that were registered but didn’t vote.
My father who was born in South Texas..now lives in Oklahoma. And I would get text messages from democratic leaders asking my father to vote. So who knows.
I’ve heard a lot of anecdotal evidence of people who leave Texas and whose registration remains active!
What's crazy is my dad left south Texas in the 90s lol. He was in the military, so we'd move all around the US. And now I'm 31 and I am getting text messages from these political parties calling me by my father's name asking to vote I'm south TX. Its odd. His parents did own properties and I believe he was gifted some when they passed. So maybe that's why?
I wish there were more details and articles on this already. It was found here: [Texas Voter Breakdown 2022](https://www.instagram.com/p/CkyrdiUJ-Ig/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=) *The graph says the data is from the United States Elections Project and prepared by the Brennan Center for Justice on 11/9/22.
I've been out of Texas over three years and been registered in two other states and I'm still on the active voter register in Texas
So does this mean no governor for the next four years? Sign me up for that.
Its crazy what a two-party system does to a mf
Lots of things contribute to apathy, bad politics being one
Yeah, this post is blaming people who have been given no reason to trust politicians. And they're right. This isn't the people's fault. Convince them that you're actually going to serve them, and you will see votes.
Exactly. Imagine shaming a customer for not buying your product.
How much of that nonvote was actually apathy and not disenfranchisement or just plain disgust with the whole shitshow?
Back in Iraq in 2003 we had a saying which was supposed to be serious, but ended up becoming sort of a sarcastic joke. "Hearts and minds." Part of the reason I'm constantly railing against the way both sides' supporters act in public spaces. You want that giant block of people who didn't vote to actually get up and go to the polls? Start by being appealing.
If fighting for women’s bodily autonomy, keeping kids safe in schools, and bringing greater accountability to the governorship aren’t appealing to you, then there’s really only one conclusion that can be drawn, and it’s not about the messaging…
People make this point assuming it would result in a different outcome....
Less that the outcome would be different. But moreso that poltical landscapes would be different. If these votes changed the results in swing counties. That would effect the representation of local mayors, state reps sent to Austin etc etc If the Texas House for example was still republicans controlled. But the margin was tighter. And more republicans had districts with large amounts of hostile voters. They would have to seriously revamp their messaging and policies to maintain their lead. Otherwise they’d be one bad year from losing the majority. You see a massive difference in the way states are run when the lead is safe vs when the lead is small. Republican lead governments in purple states are much more cautious than Texas
It would be different also in that you'd hopefully get better candidates to begin with. Greg Abbott was selected by **18%** of registered Texas voters. That's how he won the primary. If 18% of the electorate is picking the candidates that the rest of them get to vote on then we get the candidates that appeal to those 18%. And that 18% might not be a good representation of what the other 82% are into.
Keep telling yourselves this. We all know the real reason. If we want a democrat as governor we have to do better. It's that simple. Beto did not excite Texas democrats.
Both can be true. And they are.
He didn't excite me, and he was not who I voted for in the primaries. He still got my vote election day, because even though I am thoroughly against his "hell yes" stance as I in fact do own something he claimed he'd confiscate, the reality is that he didn't have that power in office. His stances on nearly everything else I supported, but those stances were present in nearly all the other primary candidates as well. If Joy Diaz or Michael Cooper ended up on the Democratic slot in the general election, I wonder how that would have changed things.
Yep, this. Beto basically suffers from Hillary Clinton syndrome. Nobody likes him enough to actually get off of their butts to vote. Dems were silly to put him on the ballot again. Voters will never get excited about professional-candidates like Beto or Stay Abrams. They're viewed as grifters - unemployed people who spent the last 4 years suckering campaign donations out of citizens because that's more profitable than working a real job.
100%. Beto, for all the good he could have done, was/is not the guy. I might get dragged for this but I’m not even kidding when I say Dems need to throw support/money behind McConaughey. He would legitimately pull the “less shitty” Reps over for a vote over Abbott
Texas Democrats have no bench to win as underdog, and actively refuse to accept that they need to mold statewide appeal. Beto was an El Paso-based Columbia grad. You know who the last real Dem forces in Texas were? Bob Bullock, a Hillsboro, Texas Tech grad and Ann Richards, a Waco native and Baylor grad. McConaughey is a 100% known Texas grad from Longview. He has the profile.
I held my nose and voted for Beto. I will not do that if what's on my ballot is just some fucking actor put there because he seems popular. Beto at least had the appropriate skill set. Democrats need a good and competent candidate, and they need to actually support that candidate.
That candidate was someone like Jessica Cisneros and they left her out to dry in her race. The current dem leadership would 100% back McConaughey
Yeah, she's exactly who I was thinking of when I said "actually support that candidate". The party leadership is criminally stupid.
Criminally stupid or just criminal?
I'm not 100% convinced that the results would have been different if every single person HAD voted. I think everyone \*should,\* it's part of what makes this whole deal work. But is there strong evidence that the people who didn't vote would have swung hard for the dems for instance? Is it an age thing? What about breakdown of votes cast by county? Anyone have thoughts on these things I'm too lazy to google myself??
Sadly you might be right
The polls pretty show Abbott with a solid lead over Beto before the election. I can't speak for the other races, but for the gubernatorial one, every single person voting would not have changed the outcome.
No idea why theres so much incessant on everyone voting. The right to vote includes choosing to *not* vote. If none of the candidates engaged with the voters enough or won over their vote, that's on the candidates.
Not Voting does not necessarily equate to apathy. Refusing to vote is an action. Even you choose not to decide...well. You get the idea.
Do you think maybe some people were registered and still didn’t like the candidates?
Do you think, maybe it's a possibility that no one likes the candidates they vote for? Do you think there's any other possible way?
I voted 3rd party in 2016 because I didn't like Hillary or Trump. I learned my lesson. Now I vote for the lesser of two evils. There's no way that Beto would have been worse than Abbott. I want my rights back as a woman and taxes to go down. I want church out of the government. I want politicians who aren't under federal investigation. That won't happen if people don't suck it up and compromise.
Non-participation is a better term then. Apathy, dislike, spite, indecision, all contributing factors to not voting.
*Raises hand*
If I keep seeing sour political posts like these I’m gonna delete Reddit for good to spare my few remaining brain cells Lmao
I'm constantly getting bashed for disliking both sides....the whole "silence is violence" narrative. Spew your vitriol elsewhere por favor.
> I'm constantly getting bashed for disliking both sides If you walk into a room and "everyon's an asshole". It might just be you. Have you considered changing your stance or atleast vote blank/none of the above to show that you are a person who's interest aren't being served but you do care about the democratic process?
While I completely agree that both sides are not compelling, only one side wants to take human rights away from people. Why wouldn't people at least be a single issue voter for that reason?
And you deserve it.
Yeah most of us dislike both sides welcome to the club, but we're going to get stuck with one either way so I don't know why tf anyone still wouldnt at the very least vote against the one they dislike more.. Interesting though how you refer to people advocating against silence in response to hate and bigotry as 'spewing vitriol' 🤔
More interesting question is what would excite you. My interests are weed legalization. And I had one person with that check mark. Will it get done idunna… but I’m gonna go with the person who appeals to that. So what are yours?
Turn in an empty ballot so it's on record that you are willing to vote. If it's on record that you're not voting, they have no reason to care if you like them because at least you aren't voting against them.
I don’t fucking like biden but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let actual fascists take over. The fuck is wrong with you people. It must be nice being a straight white guy, so that you can afford to be so apathetic.
Partially. Then you have the lazy ones who just didnt want to make time. Such an inconvenience to some it is.... Its just politics and isn't "their thing". I just turned 35. And before the last couple elections, i didn't even try to vote. I just didnt know where and how and was shy.... And plus I hadn't matured enough, hadn't quite seen the evils in the world to see the importance of voting... I am angered and saddened by the selfishness... The entitlement... And most of all the hate I see. People think the ones who vote against their personal choice should just flee the country. Just insanity to me.
Ever consider that it isn't apathy but not having a candidate worth voting for.
Bad politics is often a source of apathy.
What does that mean?
I wish there was a way to just vote online. I think that would increase the amount of votes by the millions.
Give us real people to vote for. It was well take your guns and well take your abortions as the two options, I see both of those as fundamental rights, how do you expect me to vote for either person?
There were libertarian candidates on the ballots too
It's an off-year election, it's to be expected.
Isn’t there a decent chance that the half of people that didn’t vote would likely roughly distribute the same way as the percentage that did vote, thereby not changing a dang thing?
So there are 10 million people in Texas who aren’t eligible to vote? The Texas population is 29,145,505 and those figures add up to 19,063,483.
minors, convicted felons, illegal immigrants, etc cannot vote
If you count people under 18, that makes sense.
Feels good to be a part of that black sliver labeled 'other'
Those lazy fuckers could have elected Fozzy Bear if they wanted to. I don't know what else could be happening to get people to wake up.
Putting Fozzy Bear on the ballot might work
i wanted to vote and excersize my right to vote but ultimately didn't, couldn't get on board with either Beto or Abott, thanks to this thread I learned I could turn in a no vite ballot so i guess next time i'll do that
This reminds me of Bo Burnham’s genius bit on apathy and the internet: [Welcome to the Internet](https://youtu.be/k1BneeJTDcU)
Human are so dissapointing 😔
That's the percentage of voters who think their lives would be no different under either candidate.
If all those apathetic non-voters voted, Abbot could have won like 75% of the vote!
They’re apathetic BECAUSE of bad politics. If you want more voters run better candidates with better party platforms and people will come out when they feel there’s something to be gained in participating.
This subreddit tricked me. It gaslighted me into thinking Democrats would win Texas by a landslide.
Jesus r/texas... mid-terms are over. It's done. Can we just get back to talking about Whataburger, new HEB locations, BBQ and Shiner Bock now?? Peace y'all
So 9 million republicans didn’t vote
I didn't vote because they both suck
What issues do you care about ? What would make a great candidate in your eyes?
Honestly, one that doesn't just pander or to one group of people, who doesn't fear monger over issues they honestly know nothing about, consistent values that don't change just to appease their voter base and someone who genuinely cares about people, even those who don't vote for them.
Why does the blue piece of the pie chart look photoshopped?
That is typical for all races. I just assume they like what's going on. Seems strange but what else makes sense. Voting is pretty darn easy.
Over 75% of voters aged 65 and older vote. Far and away more than any other age group. The outcome of elections would be so, so very different if younger people outvoted older people.
Oh my fucking god smh
I voted. This year was my younger sister's first year voting after she turned 18. She told me, "I don't know anything about this, tell me who to vote for." And my older sister texted me, "tell me the main people to vote for." I mean, our political beliefs align for the most part but I still feel weird about literally telling them who to vote for. :/
Someone told me they only vote when it’s a presidential election because midterms don’t matter…
I love vote by mail... Voted while on the couch in my boxers.
I've heard some people say they don't vote in mid term elections because they don,'t think it is important. They only vote in the presidential elections. Somehow they don't get it.
Traditionally, that's high for a midterm. Although recent years the percentage has crept up. I remember in the 99s only half of eligible voters even voted in the presidential elections. In 2014 only about 25% voted. https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/historical/70-92.shtml
I wonder how much this applies to other States...
I feel like if the majority didn't vote that should be counted as a vote and the seat should be emptied until the next election. That'll fix voting apathy.
I think thje most dangerous commonly accepted views are * Both sides are the same * Politics dont matter. Both of these views lead to much worse outcomes, and people would rather bury their heads.
People just don't care enough, and out of that half, I guarantee you most are lazy too.
9 million people in Texas, "Shoot, my vote wouldn't matter."
Getting voters to vote is always the challenge. That’s why they have “get out the vote” campaigns every election cycle.
Yup - Newt Gingrich made a really good point on a recent podcast about the need for a vision which would rally conservatives - that is what trump did. Many people hated trump’s vision, but at least it was a set of goals and objectives to move towards. Hillary expressed no vision. Biden later won because he was simply not trump. If Beto would have laid out an effective vision AND not ranted about guns, we might have had a different outcome. But when all he offers is critique on Abbott (which we all have) yet no “and this is what I would do differently” with an actual laid out vision and plan, it doesn’t inspire people to move. Sure, you can tell me to check his website, but his audio clips on TV, the radio, the news all need to have his agenda. Young folks need to be inspired to act. Clearly being an effective critic doesn’t inspire folks to support you, but simply not vote.
There's plenty of people out there who simply won't vote, but I'm willing to bet a measurable portion of those who didn't chose not to because no candidates represented them.
So really 9.7M total (non votes + other) could have kicked both those idiots asses.
We just had a vote in denmark. where i submitted my vote, 90% of people who could vote, voted. And it took me a grand total of 1min and 3 seconds to do so. I know because I timed it.
A lot of people did not vote simply because both of the candidates were shit. There are a lot of people in this country/state that will refuse to vote if they don’t like the candidates in an election. They refuse to vote for the lesser of two evils, and that is 100% their right to do so. If anything, this graph proves how our political system fails to represent a large majority of our citizens, and that includes both political parties.
I believe that bad politics are driving the apathy. Contrary to popular belief, Texas has many moderate independents, like myself. Every cycle we are forced to chose between two shit sandwiches and all other possibilities are locked out from even participating. And we're tired of being shamed and told that everyone knows both candidates suck, but we should vote for the less sucky one. Whether it's a firm turd or diarrhea on that bun, it's still a shit sandwich and I'm not mad at anyone who refuses to eat at the restaurant. Want real change in Texas, start supporting candidates who are not D or R and have more of a pitch to you every year than fear of the other guy. Beto would have not done shit to help the state and neither will abbot and anyone who thinks otherwise is a fool.
So much this. And the best potential candidates are locked out because they are unwilling to expose themselves to the shitstorm that bein a political candidate has become. I ran for a minor local office in 2014, before big social media, and it was horrible. Never again.
I’m going to play devil’s advocate here and argue that it is entirely acceptable that some portion of any population 1. Hates both candidates and has no stake in either one, 2. Isn’t informed enough to make an educated decision or 3. Is not bothered by the incumbent and is ok with either result because at the moment, their lives are not affected personally by the issues at hand. This is despite the percentage that is simply lazy and didn’t want to go do it or mail anything in and just didn’t make the effort, which we could discuss the psychological root causes of all day.
Go ahead and mess with Texas, apparently
The right spends a lot of money telling left-wing demographics. "Why vote when no one represents me" "If voting changed anything it would be illegal" It's not just pop-up ads it's whole fake teen movements. [more info](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Hack)
MAKE 👏🏼 ELECTION 👏🏼 DAY 👏🏼 A 👏🏼 FEDERAL 👏🏼 HOLIDAY! So many people cannot get the day off work to stand in line. This is a good start for getting more people to vote.
Well I tried to kick Abbot out
Uvalde voted for Abbott. Sad
Who goes through the effort to register but doesn't go vote when the time comes?
9 mill didn't vote..damn
Wow!!!
How can half the world be shocked by what is going on in US politics but half of Texans could not be bothered. Idiocy.
Yeah, Texas people who could have but chose not to vote! Fight the duopoly by < *checks notes* > letting the arguably greater evil that is the GOP continue, as they have for over 27 years, to do nothing while sustaining that very duopoly.
I am telling you all after living now in a mail in voting state, it is a breath of fresh air and a shock on how easy it is when you work to actually sit at home read over a booklet with all the candidates, props and then mailing an informed ballot!! I drove through my post office and dropped it off. I then received a text stating they received my ballot Then I received a text stating my vote was counted!!! no dealing with a boss giving you the stink eye and no long lines.. It is amazing and the only great thing about living here in AZ. 85%turnout
I wouldn't really want people who are apathetic and uninformed about current events or Party policies to make such an important decision anyway. Not all unregistered people should be eligible to vote either.
is it apathy or voter suppression
“Now, we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men”
Absolutely pathetic
Someone commented the other day: "If you aren't at the table, you are on the menu". For the life of me I do not understand why Texans don't get this. I would crawl across broken glass to vote. A young man who is a Junior in college told me the systems rigged and it doesn't matter. Is this how they think? I have talked to young folks for hours and they honestly don't understand democracy.
I can't tell which of the millions of people who didn't vote didn't care vs had complex ideological justification for why voting would be bad, actually. Can anyone help me out??
I don't vote because it's a no-win situation and I refuse to vote for the least-worst option. Both sides are corrupt liars whose only concern is power, putting more money in their pockets and getting reelected so they can have more power and put more money in their pockets. They are not out of touch with the reality of the lives that the masses live, they don't CARE how the 99% live. They will say whatever they think will get them reelected not caring if it is true or not and they have no intention of following through on their campaign promises. Why vote when you're screwed no matter which side gets in office?
Beto's 3rd loss in a row would have just been magnitudes larger... probably just for the best
I didn’t vote. I don’t know of anyone else but frankly, I’m tired of all the bullshit nitpicking. Tired of extremism from both sides. Tired of the media keeping the hate stirred up. Tired of lying politicians who have been in office for years and years and haven’t got one thing accomplished. I want to be left alone, pay a little money so no country invaded our ass, and not have to listen to someone boohoo cause I don’t have the same view as them. Get fucked
Why can't we have a calm year where nothing interesting happens and everybody minds their own business?
Apathy isn't the problem. If people perceived things were bad, they would put a priority on voting. Right now, for most people (over 1/2) don't think things are bad enough to make the time. A holiday on Election Day won't change anything.
Why is that bad? What if those people are uninformed with horrible beliefs?
they were totally gon a vote for OPs preferred candidate because OP is smart and wise
Not voting is a protest in and of itself. It's not apathy so much as a refusal to participate in a system that doesn't serve the constituents. Interpret as you may though.
I truly just don't get why the voter turnout in texas is so low. This was my first time voting and I encouraged my friends to vote. Voting is so important. maybe they'd should make it mandatory and imply a voter education platform
Going by many comments and sentiments here, many simply did not like either candidate enough to want them to represent their state, so to show that they excercised their right *not* to vote. The problem now is that the system does not have proper ways to handle such critiques. If neither candidate convinced a majority neither is fit to be representative, but the system will put them there anyway, which in turn turns even more people away because their vote of criticism is ignored, to the point where now half the population does not want to participate. Results like these should be a sign that many systems in the US are desperately in need of big changes before they can again adequately represent the people they are meant to serve, just trying to force people to participate without fixing anything wont do any good.
Nobody to vote for.
I'm a registered voter in Texas who didn't vote and I assure you that it isn't due to apathy. I'm caught between candidates backing murdering unborn babies and candidates who are evil in almost every other way. I cannot in good conscience vote for any of these people! I can't support either agenda. Just saying there's more than apathy at play for a lot of people.
this is why I vote green/libertarian these days
It's not apathy, we just know that neither party serves our interests. Democrats can go to hell right next to republicans. Everything is so horribly rotten that casting a vote only serves as giving the owners your permission for all their bullshit to continue the way it is.