As the fifth largest voter jurisdiction in the country, Orange County encompasses a significant portion of the popular vote – making the area a prime microcosm of the political trends emerging across the nation. Jackie Wu, community outreach manager for the Orange County Registrar of Voters, told The Panther Oct. 28 that voter registration in Orange County surpassed the 1.7 million mark in early September, which is a little over half of the 3.1 million Orange County residents. 

 These numbers reflect a widespread increase in early voter turnout. While 2014 had the lowest national midterm voter turnout in four decades at 41.9%, 2018 had the highest. Categorically, 18 to 29-year-olds played a heavy role in the landmark increase in voter turnout, with the number of youth voters alone having increased by 79%. A similar surge of political awareness is evidenced by the 94 million votes already cast for the Nov. 3 election, about 68% of the total ballots counted for the 2016 presidential election. 

“Naturally, there has been a growing population in Orange County, and for those who are coming of age, there have been efforts like pre-registration and voter drives taking place,” Wu said. “We’ve been seeing the fruits of all those efforts now.”

The Orange County Registrar of Voters have set up multiple methods for residents to vote during the pandemic. Chapman University’s Civic Engagement Initiatives continues to encourage students to vote after witnessing only 57.2% of eligible Chapman voters participate in the 2016 election, as outlined in a report by the National Study of Learning, Voting and Engagement. Justin Koppelman, associate director of Student Engagement, said the department annually pays $1,750 to Democracy Works, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization, to make TurboVote available for all Chapman affiliates. The software guides first-time voters through the registration process and notifies users of updates to voting centers with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. 

According to Shishei Tsang, a program coordinator of Civic Engagement Initiatives, the university has seen a total of 1014 Chapman students utilize TurboVote since the start of the fall semester, 350 of which took advantage of the provided, one-on-one assistance. Based on the data from Aug. 31 to early November, Tsang estimated there was a 200% increase in usage of the TurboVote software in comparison to the 2016 election year. Koppelman added that concrete voter data won’t be accessible until spring 2021.

“College campuses serve as a space for more discussion where we can purposely bring up (political issues) so students can be a part of the conversation,” Tsang said. “This conversation contributes to Orange County’s voter turnout, plus Civic Engagement is making it more accessible for students to vote.”

The unpredictable nature behind voter behavior, and therefore the inability to get an accurate estimate of voter turnout until data is finalized, is a reality also being faced within the Orange County Registrar of Voters. The deadline for mail-in voting to count requires ballots to be postmarked by Nov. 3 and received no later than 17 days after. Despite local and national concerns surrounding the recent placement of fake, misleading ballot boxes from the Republican Party and potential delays with the United States Postal Service, Wu said that 40% of Orange County voters already submitted their ballot by mail, and she encourages more voters to submit their ballots early to confirm it’s processed in time.

In an attempt to provide an accessible voting center for students who opt to cast their ballot in-person, Tsang worked closely with Lead Civic Engagement Assistant Hanna Marcus, a senior strategic and corporate communication major, in order to gain approval from Chapman administration and the Orange County Registrar of Voters to assemble an on-campus vote center. All Orange County voters can visit room 119B in Chapman University’s Argyros Forum Oct. 30 to Nov. 2 from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Nov. 3 from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

“If a student has to walk or drive more than five or 10 minutes, then they’re not going to vote,” Marcus said. 

Marcus noted the political apathy she felt on campus as a freshman working with Civic Engagement Initiatives. Conversely, the perceived high stakes within the 2020 election has galvanized an emerging political awareness she’s proud to see within the student body, she said. However, Marcus was quick to express concern that, similar to the decrease in outward support of the Black Lives Matter movement since June, students may tune out political conversations after the election.

“Right now, I feel like people are so focused on the idea of Biden or Trump,” Marcus said. “I don’t think a lot of students are at all engaged beyond voting in the general election, because they assume that they’ve performed their civic duty … There absolutely are students who do more than that, but beyond the political science students, how do we reach those students?”

Civic Engagement Initiatives continues to offer information to students through their new Instagram account @chapmancivic and the “CU At The Booths” website, which provides students a complete list of resources to make informed decisions while at the polls. The Orange County Registrar of Voter also provides a voter guide for Orange County voters on their website.