Are You A “Likely Voter?”… Good for You! But We Need “Unlikely Voters” to Win This Election …

by
dominique DiPrima

Throughout this election season much has been made of how this is a tight race. National polls from a variety of outlets find President Barack Obama consistently tied or within a two or three point margin with the challenger Willard “Mitt” Romney. Before the first presidential debate, the Commander-In-Chief seemed to be pulling away, and polling showed him with significant leads in key battleground states like Florida and Ohio. Post-debate, with the Republican hype machine in full swing, some polls show Romney catching up and even taking leads in some of the same up-for-grabs states.

This weeks Gallup poll shows Romney with a 2-point advantage over the President. And this is the first week the survey has switched to counting only likely voters. When you count all registered voters, the President still has a 3-point lead.

The latest Pew Research Center survey, also released this week, offers the same picture. President Obama and candidate Romney are tied among all registered voters. But when you narrow the focus to likely voters, Romney has a 4-point advantage.

Likely voter samples are controversial. There is no standard way to tell who is a likely voter, so every polling organization uses their own method. Studies show that people actually lie about whether or not they will really vote. Four years ago only 62% of all eligible adults voted. And even among those who were registered, 10% did not make it out to cast their ballot. In 2008 only 70% of Black men voted (compared with 76% of White men…And 80% of Black women according to the Atlanta Star Constitution.)

To me the logic is clear! If the president is winning by wide margins among all registered voters, and tied or losing among so-called likely voters, our job is to turn out the unlikely voter!!! If you are one of the 30% of African American men who sat it out in historic 2008, if you are one of the 20% of sistahs who had too much to do on election day four years ago, we need you now! In fact, if you are Asian, Latino, Arab-American, European American, Pacific Islander, Indigeneous, LGBT, Native American, youth, or “other” and you are not likely to vote, we are looking for you! If you have never voted simply because you have never voted, or you always forget to register, or you are not sure if you’re eligible, it’s time to do a new thing.

The most powerful factor in this upcoming election is not money, television, or debate performances – it’s the unlikely voter. Forget the independents, the swing states and the pundits. If you can get your cousin RayRay, your boyfriend or your teenage BFF to vote, if we all can, the President wins big. If not, Willard and his merry band of billionaires will be moving in to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in January. It’s that simple.

So let’s do it people! Take your “Boo” to the ballot box, hit the homey up to register, give Ray Ray a ride to vote (along with your Granny & Granddad!) Poke your Facebook friends (and “unfriends,”) your co-workers and no-workers, your too-hip-to-participate pals, your not-paying-attention-family, and your just-plain-lazy associates. These are the mighty, mighty “unlikely voters” and they will carry us across the finish line on any given Sunday, er, Tuesday. All hail the “unlikely” voters! May they vote in droves…Less likely things have happened.