Internal PLTV data shows that 43.1% of eligible students voted in the 2022 midterm elections, outpacing the national institutional rate \u2014 and earning<\/a> Penn a \u201cMost Engaged Campus for College Student Voting\u201d designation that year. Penn still lagged behind nearly every other Ivy League institution in registration, but 58% of its registered voters cast a ballot, far exceeding peer institutions\u2019 yield rates.<\/p>\n Get the DP delivered straight to your inbox.<\/p>\n Sign Up<\/a><\/p>\n Penn Leads the Vote helped spur a nearly 450% increase in campus voter turnout between 2014 and 2018. Though turnout has continuously fluctuated since 2012 \u2014 with upticks in presidential election years, when civic engagement renews \u2014 it has generally risen over the 10-year period.\u00a0<\/p>\n More than three-quarters of eligible Penn students voted in the 2020 presidential election, a 9% increase from 2016. In 2024, in-person turnout far exceeded<\/a> 2020\u2019s, which was severely curtailed by the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n Last year\u2019s off-cycle election drew record turnout<\/a> at Penn. Over the past decade, the November 2025 contest was the only election without a national race to bring more than 1,500 voters to campus polling locations.<\/p>\n Penn Leads the Vote spent the run-up to this year\u2019s midterms hosting registration drives on Locust Walk to drive sign-ups and turnout. The group also works with members of the College House system to hold events and encourage students to register.<\/p>\n According to Ashley Kim, a College senior and the group\u2019s director, volunteers registered<\/a> 170 people on National Voter Registration Day alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n Marc Meredith, a political science professor, said in an interview that he expects this November\u2019s midterms to match the record turnout the University has seen in recent years \u2014 though \u201cwe won\u2019t really know that until election day itself.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI think young people often feel like they have more knowledge about the presidency than perhaps they have about their state governments,\u201d Meredith said. \u201cI think a lot of it is this feeling that you have an ability to know who you want to vote for president in a way you might not feel the same about a governor or a senator.\u201d<\/p>\n Noting a marked decline in campaign presence and television commercials, Meredith said Pennsylvania\u2019s political climate is a far cry from the charged environment of two years ago.<\/p>\n \u201cGiven the vibes around the governor race this time and the polling that suggests it\u2019s not as close as we usually experience statewide elections here, I wonder if that is going to have some effect on the ultimate turnout outcome,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n According to a September poll, 58% of Pennsylvania\u2019s likely voters said they would vote<\/a> for incumbent Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro over Republican challenger Stacy Garrity, who currently serves as the state\u2019s treasurer.<\/p>\n Earlier this month, Penn Democrats hosted Shapiro for a meet-and-greet. State Rep. Chris Rabb (D-200), who is running to represent Pennsylvania\u2019s third congressional district in the United States House of Representatives \u2014 which includes Penn \u2014 spoke<\/a> at a panel on reproductive justice on campus last week.\u00a0<\/p>\n The deadline to register to vote in Pennsylvania is Oct. 19. Election Day is Nov. 3.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 2020, then-Penn President Amy Gutmann made an ambitious pledge: that within eight years, every eligible member of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":309669,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[69,71,70],"class_list":["post-309668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309668\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/309669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"chart](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1792389728_750_thumbnail.jpeg\")
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