Young Voters Led Historic Turnout in WI Supreme Court Election Primary

In response to the record-setting youth turnout in Wisconsin’s Supreme Court primary election, NextGen America President Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez released the following statement:

“Early data shows that Wisconsin’s critical Supreme Court primary election Tuesday night was decided by a historic and overwhelming surge in youth voter turnout. There is so much at stake in this race, with implications for the future of abortion access and voting rights in Wisconsin, and NextGen America is proud of our work online and on the ground to contact and mobilize young people in this primary.

“Most importantly, this primary result shows an unprecedented level of youth vote retention between elections. In the Madison ward that contains the two largest first-year dorms, young people demonstrated a nearly eight times increase from 2019 in voter retention from a general to a spring primary. At one of the main polling locations for UW-Madison freshmen, over 500 votes were cast – a major jump from 2019, when only 44 votes were cast in the same location.

“This underscores the power of continued and sustained investment in young voters – and would not have been possible without NextGen’s work and the work of our partners across the state leading up to the 2022 midterm elections and into the winter.

“Student’s lives are busy, and with so much going on, a spring primary election could be an easy one to miss – but this year it wasn’t. We see our rights being taken away and are stating very clearly that enough is enough. As NextGen looks to the April 4 general election, we are diving in with renewed energy and passion for our work. This is about creating a government that respects us, reflects us, and represents us, and we’re not slowing down our work to educate and mobilize young voters to create the future we want and believe in.”

###

About NextGen America

NextGen America is the leading national organization for engaging young people through voter education, registration and mobilization. We invite 18-to-35 year olds — the largest and most diverse generation in American history — into our democracy to ensure our government works for them and to find new solutions to the dire challenges facing our society and the world. Since 2013, NextGen America has registered more than 1.3 million young voters and contacted 9.6 million young eligible voters during the historic 2022 midterm elections.