Happy Iowa Caucus day! It seems like ages ago we set out to get all of the 2012 presidential candidates on the record about how they’d protect your right to vote. Tonight we’ll find out who will win the first-in-the-nation Iowa Caucus. But why vote today, a Tuesday? That’s exactly the question I answer in an op-ed on CNN.com:

The short answer: We vote on Tuesday for absolutely no good reason. This is true especially when you consider the United States, arguably the world’s most famous democracy, has ranked near the bottom of all nations in voter participation for more than half a century. And that’s not because, as Mitt Romney suggested to me last month, we need great candidates to increase voter turnout. Heard of JFK? Reagan? (more…)

Posted in Election 2012, Why do we vote on Tuesday? | 5 Comments »

Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum don’t know why we vote on Tuesday. Mitt Romney thinks good candidates will increase voter turnout. And Michele Bachmann stands on an apple box when speaking at the podium. Those are a few things I learned after three days on the ground in Iowa, home of our first-in-the-nation Iowa Caucuses.

On January 3rd, voters in Iowa will start the nominating process for the Republican presidential nominee and in all likelihood, voter participation will not be good. It hasn’t been for the last fifty-plus years, and all indications are that isn’t going to be any better this time around.

Making matters worse, new obstacles to casting a ballot across the nation are so bad Attorney General Eric Holder spoke up last week with a major address at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum in Austin, Texas. His message: nearly half a century after LBJ signed the Voting Rights Act, our right to vote is in jeopardy.

How will our presidential candidates protect our right to vote? Now seemed as good a time as ever to bring this vital question to the 2012 candidates campaigning in Iowa, so we teamed up with Participant Media’s TakePart, and that’s exactly what we did. (more…)

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Our co-founder and resident scholar Norman J. Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute appeared with legendary political journalist Jeff Greenfield on the PBS series Need To Know last week to discuss “Making Congress Work.” They were joined by Mickey Edwards, the former Republican Congressman from Oklahoma and Democratic Congressman Jim Cooper of Tennessee.

Laura LeBlanc at PBS provides context for this conversation:

Congress has never been very popular, but its public image is currently at a historic low. Recent approval ratings for the first branch of government range from only 9 to 13 percent, depending on whom you ask, and frustration is coming from both sides of the political aisle… As a body, Congress is more polarized than ever.

Amongst all of the topics discussed in their nearly 20-minute chat was how to raise voter participation. Norm suggested mandatory voting and also Weekend Voting, as you might suspect. The discussion of voter participation starts at the 8-minute mark. (more…)

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Yes, indeed, I did quote Chris Rock yesterday on MSNBC when talking about our efforts to making voting as accessible, convenient and reliable for all Americans. I spoke with host Thomas Roberts about the Weekend Voting Act and ways the franchise is being restricted this election cycle.

Thomas kicked off our chat with an important question:

Why have the rules around this vote not changed and stuck around so long as modern day society has obviously advanced from having to worry about our harvest and leaving from home on a Sunday night to get somewhere by Tuesday?

To find out my answer, watch the video. (more…)

Posted in Chris Rock, Election 2012, Weekend voting | 1 Comment »

Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain has submitted the first video response to the Why Tuesday? Candidate Challenge. Two weeks ago we asked all of the 2012 candidates, including President Obama, as we did in 2008, to send us a video with their ideas for increasing America’s low voter participation.

As you’ll see in Mr. Cain’s video, he specifically answers our question about whether or not he believes the American voting system is broken. Mr. Cain says he does not believe the American voting system is broken.

Mr. Cain acknowledges, however, America’s low voter turnout in his response. “More people need to participate,” he says, “in order to enhance the integrity as well as to better represent the voice of the people.” One of the fixes Mr. Cain says he’d like to see to “improve the integrity of our system,” is “requiring picture IDs” for voters. Watch the video for his complete answer. (more…)

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Photos | Press Release

This morning we held our 2012 kickoff with the panel “Creating The Voting Rights Act of 2012″ at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. At the event we officially unveiled our new website, a new video, our 2012 Candidate Challenge and lots more.

This is the second “Why Tuesday? Candidate Challenge,” following the our first successful effort in 2008. That year, presidential candidates Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John McCain, Hillary Clinton, Mike Huckabee and others participated, personally describing in videos posted to WhyTuesday.org what they would do to increase and protect voter participation in America.

Our founder Bill Wachtel made opening remarks, and on the panel was Mimi Marziani, counsel at the Brennan Center, Why Tuesday? advisory board member Meghan McCain, David Becker, the director of election initiatives at Pew, and yours truly. It was moderated by Why Tuesday? co-founder and American Enterprise Institute resident Scholar Norm Ornstein.

UPDATE: Read Ezra Klein’s piece for The Washington Post about our relaunch.

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