Voting & Commerce

    With a push for more and more young adults to get out and vote in their local elections, what is its impact on Commerce? I asked Graduate Research Assistant and former A&M-Commerce College Democrats leader Meredith 'Grace' Slayter about the impact of the youth vote in Commerce.

 It is no secret that there has been a struggle to get young voters motivated to participate in local elections, (a Washington Post article as recent as March 2020 examined this). In fact, Commerce is considered a "Go Texan Certified Retirement Community." Taking this into account, there is the question of how active young Commerce voters are? How big of a desire is there to support local elections? According to Slayter, students are motivated to vote, but it varies. 

    " There are some that want to vote and are motivated to the point that they will find out how and inform themselves," Slayter said. "There are some that are motivated, but get overwhelmed with the number of choices and information they receive and sometimes end up not voting."

    She also stated that she feels students aren't aware of the voting power that they have. She cited observing that students at A&M-Commerce often state that there is not much to do in the city, without knowing that this can be changed through voting. By participating in their local elections, people can have an impact. 

    "I think the youth vote in Commerce could take the town as a whole into a new phase of its life," she said. "But there are not many that realize that."

     she feels Commerce has a unique level of motivation regarding politics. When doing voter registration for 2018, she noticed that there was a large turnout. Lines of 20 people each showed up, looking to register. She also recalls driving over 56 people to local polling areas. She stated that the numbers were so large that even voter registration helpers from other universities were impressed.

    "When we did a big registration event we had people come and help that had done voter registration at places like UNT," she said. "And they told me that the crowds and numbers we had register to vote were the biggest they had seen."

     She stated that she hopes this level of motivation regarding voting is maintained.

"I think students in Commerce are uniquely motivated compared to other university students in the area," she said."I'm not sure why that is but I hope that their motivation is continually fed."

Video:

https://animoto.com/play/VKKravPl43WUCsyWgvpGVQ