Dayna Firth got a phone call from the Barack Obama campaign last week. We're making some changes to Florida's Democratic National Convention delegation, Obama's people told her; you'll have to go through the selection process again if you want to remain an at-large delegate.
Firth took it all in stride. She's done a lot in politics: registering new voters and doing other volunteer jobs for Obama, traveling to Iowa during the Democratic caucuses to report on the campaigns for ImGay TV, an online news and social networking site for the LGBT community.
Then there's her work as president of the New College Democrats in Sarasota, her membership in the Hillsborough LGBT Caucus and coordinating the campus Students for Obama chapter. Firth's political activities keep her pretty occupied when she's not studying.
"I had three … jobs lined up [for the summer break,]" the Seminole Heights resident said, "but when you think about volunteering and all campaign work, I just couldn't do them."
It's not a bad political resume — for an 18-year-old.
Firth is the face of a new youth vote in America. It is a group that seems particularly energized by Obama's charisma and message, armed with social networking sites and political news and views delivered by the minute to their ever-present laptops.
Every four years, a handful of civic groups, rock stars and Democratic campaigners proclaim that this is the Year of the Young Voter. They're determined to tap into the Millennials, 18-29-year-olds, a demographic that traditionally votes in very low numbers.
The holy grail of a united and powerful youth voting bloc has remained out of reach since 1972, the first election in which the voting age was lowered to 18. Its dismal performance since then has prompted skepticism among professional politicos and pundits. The right-wing National Review wrote in 2004, "The youth vote is bunk. It's a mirage. Fool's gold. A Nietzschean vital lie. A will-o'-the-wisp. A media confabulation. Nonsense. Hooey. Baloney, bilge, hogwash and hooey."
Historically speaking, it's hard to argue with that assessment. In 1972, George McGovern hoped to tap into a newly empowered, anti-Vietnam War youth vote for a victory. Instead, despite the highest youth vote participation rate ever — 52 percent of all 18-29-year-olds who were registered to vote — McGovern had his ass handed to him by Richard Nixon, who trotted out young, pretty campaign volunteers called "Nixonettes." Tricky Dick carried 48 percent of young voters.
Youth voting rates have dropped every year since then. Until 2004.
Four years ago, youth voting rose to 47 percent, a rate that was 11 points higher than in the 2000 presidential election. The rate also rose in 2006, 3 percent higher than during the 2002 midterm election.
Is the youth vote poised for a breakthrough year in 2008?
Marley Jackman is a journalist who covered the Obama rally at the St. Pete Times Forum in Tampa in May. She and the other reporters at her newspaper plan a special election pullout section later in the fall before the November balloting.
Jackman's newspaper is the student publication at Hillsborough High School. She's not old enough to vote at 17, but she will be on Election Day.
The editor-in-chief of The Red and Black says the war in Iraq weighs heavy on high school students and figures in their political decisions.
"We had Navy recruiters come into our class and talk with us, and we said, 'seriously, no thank you,'" Jackman said. "No one wants to be sent to Iraq. We don't want our friends to get shot or blown up."
Student enthusiasm for the upcoming election goes beyond that of 2004, Jackman believes.
"In my freshman year, no one expected Bush to lose," Jackman said. "Now we feel like our vote is going to count."
Another Obama supporter in Tampa echoed Jackman's assessment.
"I don't think there were the same options in 2004," said Erin Moyse, a 25-year-old Obama volunteer from Tampa. "I was registered as an independent in 2004. This is actually the first campaign I have ever gotten into before. I was not interested in politics before. For me it is not about the party; it is definitely the man."
Voter registration organizers say they can't promise a huge turnout but insist that something different is going on in 2008.
"Every sign indicates this is going to be a big, big election," said Mike Slater of Project Vote, a nonprofit, nonpartisan group focused on increasing youth and minority voter participation. "I think we may have a real opportunity to expand the electorate to include people who haven't participated or who haven't been engaged in the process."
He cites the popularity of Obama as the main cause.
"It's clear that something's resonating, and that's a lot of what's behind this," Slater said.
Project Vote will register at least 1.2 million people for this election, with half of those being new voters. Half of those will be young voters. In Florida, where ACORN does Project Vote's work, that will equate to 60,000-100,000 possible new voters.
And Project Vote is not alone in trying to pump up youth participation rates. Rock the Vote remains a large youth-and-music movement. HeadCount hooked up with summer tours for such artists as Dave Matthews Band, John Mayer, Jack Johnson and Pearl Jam, who played last week in Tampa, where HeadCount volunteers manned a booth to sign up unregistered grunge fans. HeadCount hopes to sign up 100,000 voters at 1,000 concerts.
Still, the raw numbers work against those counting on the youth vote. Even if you take solace in the voting rate increase to 47 percent in 2004, you have to weigh that against the fact that people in their 50's and 60's vote at a rate of 73 percent.
The youth voting numbers are even lower in Florida. While national youth voting rates have gone up in the past two November elections, the trend is the opposite in the Sunshine State. In the 2006 midterm elections, just 18 percent of registered young voters bothered to cast a ballot, the 47th lowest rate in the nation.
The stats are lower still in Tampa Bay. In 2006, the youth voting rate was 16 percent, 2 percentage points below the state average and 9 points below the national average.
To give some further perspective on the role of young voters in Florida, consider this factoid from the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE): In the January primary, voters under the age of 30 accounted for only 8 percent of all Democratic ballots cast.
"Political elders have been rightly skeptical of the influence of the youth vote in presidential elections for two reasons," said Florida-based Democratic pollster Thom Eldon. "It has never materialized as a large voting bloc despite expectations. It tends to look much more like [the larger voting pool in] America than expected. It doesn't vote as a bloc."
But Eldon does see a difference in this year's campaigns vs. previous presidential elections.
"The expectation is this year could be different, and given changes in the communication and information age, it very well might be different," he said. "The two great impediments to the youth vote materializing as a political force might both be removed in Obama's favor."
First, it is far easier to vote today than it was in 1972, thanks to early voting and absentee ballots that serve as vote-by-mail. Second, there is the bipartisan nature of Obamamania on college campuses. "I have talked to college professors who tell me of Republican students who are lining up behind Obama or are at least indifferent to McCain," Eldon said. "If Obama is able to come close to breaking even with the Republican under-25 vote, he is going to pile up a considerable vote advantage."
Wishful thinking, local Republicans say.
"Young voters will be a factor, and there is a lot of enthusiasm for Sen. McCain's candidacy across the board," said Greg Truax, political director for the Hillsborough Republican Party in a state where McCain is currently 9 percentage points ahead in polling. "His appeal is to cut pork and protect the environment. He has a demonstrated crossover appeal that plays very well here in Florida."
For the record, polling is mixed on who is winning the youth vote in Florida; Obama is beating McCain in the 18-44 age bracket by a 50 percent-39 percent margin in a mid-May Quinnipiac University survey in Florida, while a March poll by Public Policy Polling found the pair in a dead heat in the 18-29 demographic.
Today's young voters have an unexpectedly serious, and long-term, set of issues that goes beyond just the ones you'd expect: education and opposition to the war. Several teens interviewed for this story cited the economy and difficulty getting jobs, health care and even concern for the survival of Social Security.
Given the current president's unpopularity across the board and his eight years in office, some young voters have what seem to them lifelong political grievances.
"We've grown up in a government where I feel like we aren't understood," said Victoria Simenson, a 17-year-old who cut classes with some friends from Newsome High School to attend the Obama rally. "And I haven't agreed with our government since I was, like, 9 years old. It's so nice to see people I agree with running for president."
The teens said they weren't just buying the media hype on Obama.
"[The] message behind the motivational and powerful speaking is what's most important. That's why we're here," said Nick Russell, one of the Newsome students at the Obama speech. "We're here to see for ourselves: Is he really meaning what he is saying; is he really going to do this?"
Today's young voters have tools that their predecessors didn't: Campaigns are on MySpace and Facebook, making access easy and familiar; young voters can look up any issue or assertion they passionately care about; and YouTube delivers campaign ads at any hour of the day or night vs. a media buy focused on broadcast television shows, such as Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy, that skew to older viewers.
"Our generation, we just want to know something about a candidate," Simenson said. "If we're curious about his political viewpoint on an issue, we just look it up."
That's especially easy on college campuses that are largely wireless and focused on learning. [See the related story on Florida campus politics.]
All that activity on campus, however, hides one of the dirty little secrets about the youth vote. As low as college voters' participation rates are, their non-college counterparts vote even less often, about half the rate of university students.
"When they talk about youth vote, it is code for college kids," Project Vote's Slater said. "The real challenge is: Will we see anyone go beyond the college voters to the other half of young voters? How do we find issues that appeal to them beyond those on the campus?"
That demographic includes more young voters of color and in lower economic ranges, groups that are already horribly underrepresented at the polls.
"The other half aren't touched by the campaigns as effectively," Slater said. "When you leave campuses, you lose some of the intensity that drives participation."
So, how do organizers get non-college youth voters to vote? Slater doesn't have a good answer beyond trying to register as many of them as possible and hope they turn out.
Back to Dayna Firth, the Obama delegate. She insists that skepticism about the youth vote only fuels young voters' determination.
"It has a lot to do with that youth are kind of tired that everybody says they never vote and they don't listen to us," Firth said. "We have such a huge voice that isn't being heard right now."
She voted for the first time in the January primary ("It was kind of cool that it was the first time") and has been a political junkie since she was 15. "I watch Chris Matthews every time he comes on television," Firth said. "My sophomore year in high school I read Hardball, and I just got so hooked after reading it. I just started paying attention, and then I thought, 'I can really make a difference.'
"I think there is something really cool about America that gives you that sense," Firth said, "and I love that."
This article appears in Jun 18-24, 2008.