The CEO of a nonpartisan group that works to get people to vote says that the number of people who registered to vote went up by 700% after President Joe Biden said he would not run for reelection.
Andrea Hailey, CEO of Vote.org, says that almost 40,000 new voters signed up in the 48 hours after Biden said he was stopping his campaign and supporting Vice President Kamala Harris.
“Most of the spikes were among young people,” Hailey told “The Hill” on NewsNation. “The age range of most of the people who signed up was 18 to 34.”
Hailey saw big rises in registration in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin, which are all important swing states. By the end of the week after Biden’s speech, Vote.org had counted more than 142,000 new registrations across the country.
In addition, the group said that young women voters were especially interested.
“We’re also seeing a rise in the number of young women who want to vote,” Hailey said.
Even though there were a lot more registrations after Biden’s announcement, Hailey said that neither the Republican nor Democratic national conventions caused any big changes.
Hailey warned that some new state rules about voter ID laws could make it harder for younger people to vote.
“For example, some states have laws that say you can’t use your student ID as ID to vote anymore, but you could use a hunting license,” she said.
Vote.org says that 81% of people who register to vote also vote, which means there is a good chance that newly registered people will cast ballots in November.