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I had an interesting conversation last night with a young girl I work with. Her sister is attending college in Connecticut. Apparently at the college she was encouraged to register to vote. She had explained that she lives in New York and had already applied for an absentee ballot. She was told since she spends seven months in college she should register in Connecticut. (She is a freshman, so has only been in CT a few months) She registered and I assume will vote. The girl I was talking to said her sister asked her to pick up her NY...

As college students prepare to enter a threadbare workforce, some are learning what outsiders have long suspected: Their professors were wrong. “The college vote is up for grabs this year — to an extent that would have seemed unlikely two years ago, when a generation of young people seemed to swoon over Barack Obama,” Kirk Johnson reports in The New York Times. “Though many students are liberals on social issues, the economic reality of a weak job market has taken a toll on their loyalties: far fewer 18- to 29-year-olds now identify themselves as Democrats compared with 2008.” “Is the...

The young people will never come out to vote, even for Barack Obama. They're the most unreliable demographic. They'd rather play video games. That was the underlying message from pundits in the months leading up to the presidential election. History showed that the youngest voters don't show up to the polls in masses. That changed Tuesday, when, for the first time since 1972, at least half of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 voted, according to preliminary statistics from the Center of Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.

Early reports are indicating that the youngest members of the country's electorate voted Tuesday in higher numbers than in the last presidential election — and they voted more Democratic. Youth turnout appears to be exceeding 2004 levels, which was itself a year with a big surge in voters ages 18 to 29. “We expected record turnout, and that is what we’re seeing right now,” says Heather Smith, a spokeswoman for Rock the Vote, an organization that works to encourage young people to register and vote in every election. What’s more, young voters may prove to have been the key to...

"Hip Hop" Voter Bus Ready to Roll - Alameda County and AC Transit Join to Register Young Voters OAKLAND—Alameda County and AC Transit are hitting the road together again this fall with a unique Voter Registration Bus that is designed to attract more people — particularly younger voters — into the elections process. In a unique alliance, AC Transit and the County are setting out to register as many voters as possible — using a Voter Registration Bus with an eye-catching, "hip hop" design. The bus, believed to be the only one its kind in the nation, will travel...

On Friday's "Hardball," Chris Matthews interviewed a number of student members of the group Concerned Youth of America. One of those students -- Caroline -- is his daughter, a student at the University of Pennsylvania. Did Matthews disclose that fact as he interviewed her? Not so much:

STEUBENVILLE -EMPTY ENVELOPE — Brian D’Amico, vice president of the College Republicans at Franciscan University of Steubenville, holds the torn and empty envelope that was received Friday at the Jefferson County Board of Elections. D’Amico said he had mailed the envelope containing 115-130 voter registration forms a week ago but it was stamped at the Youngstown postal center as “received unsealed.” Some voter registration forms originally thought to be missing were delivered today to the Jefferson County Board of Elections. Diane Gribble, director of the board of elections, said 56 voter registration cards were delivered today from the Pittsburgh post...

The American Civil Liberties Union announced today that it has filed a federal lawsuit against Michigan electoral officials over what the organization characterizes as two "statewide voter purge programs" that it claims would "disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of Michigan voters"—many of them college students—in advance of the fall presidential election. The legal action comes two days after Democratic nominee Barack Obama's campaign and the Democratic National Committee filed a lawsuit against Michigan over another voter-exclusion practice—using home foreclosure lists to challenge a person's right to vote. The lawsuits suggest that ballot battles in the key battleground state have just started...

Norfolk elections officials today reluctantly loosened their procedures for registering college students to vote after protests from presidential candidate Barack Obama’s campaign and an admonishment from state election officials