ROCK HILL, SOUTH CAROLINA – Winthrop University students are being reminded to not only register to vote but also to vote in the upcoming South Carolina state and local elections on Nov. 8.
E-mails have been sent to urge students to register to vote this week, if they haven’t already. If students are not registered to vote and live in South Carolina, they can go to https://info.scvotes.sc.gov/eng/ovr/start.aspx to start the online voter registration process.
To participate in the Nov. 8 election, South Carolina residents have to register 30 days in advance. The online voter registration deadline is Sunday, Oct. 9, at 11:59 p.m.
Voters will be picking a governor, a superintendent of education, U.S. House of Representative members, S.C. House and Senate members, county council members, school board members and many more candidates.
Winthrop has a proud tradition of getting out the student vote. In the 2020 presidential election, 75 percent of the student body voted, up 17.8 percent from the 2016 presidential election and well above the 66 percent national student voting rate.
Another way for students to stay connected is to sign up for TurboVote at https://winthrop.turbovote.org which will send out election reminders, provide a look at ballots and help participants come up with a plan to vote.
Winthrop faculty members said TurboVote will also walk individuals through the voter registration process for any state. TurboVote will even cover the costs of printing and stamps if a registration form or absentee ballot needs to be mailed, according to Katarina Moyon with the John C. West Forum on Politics and Policy.
For students who want to be active with the election process, they are encouraged to become Student Voting Ambassadors. For more information, contact Political Science Professor Jennifer Leigh Disney, chair of the Department of Political Science, at disneyj@winthrop.edu.
