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Estimates put youth vote turnout at 50 percent, heavily for Clinton except among whites

Every election year, the folks at the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement take a look at the youth vote—citizens aged 18-29. CIRCLE’s preliminary estimates were based on the National Exit Poll and state exit polls conducted by Edison Research. These put the youth turnout at about 24 million. That is right at 50 percent of the eligible citizens in that age group, a better showing than the 45.2 percent who turned out in 2012 but below the 51 percent of 2008. Overall, an estimated 56.8 percent of the total eligible population voted this year. A Census survey released early next year will firm up these estimates.

The record turnout for the youth cohort remains what it’s been for four decades: 52 percent in 1972, the first year 18-year-old citizens could vote in presidential elections. Voters aged 18-29 cast 19 percent of total votes in the 2016 presidential election. That’s a match for the youth cohort’s share of the total vote in 2012:

Young voters, ages 18-29, supported Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump by 55% to 37%. Among young people of color, Clinton won by even more decisive margins.

The 37% youth support for the Republican candidate in 2016 equals the support garnered by Mitt Romney in 2012. However, youth support for the Democratic candidate dropped: it was 60% for President Obama’s reelection in 2012, and 55% for Clinton this year. Notably, while in the last presidential election 97% of young voters chose one of the two major party candidates, this year only 92% did so, as nearly 1 in 10 youth (8%) selected a third-party option or otherwise eschewed voting for Clinton or Trump.

The percentage of youth supporting the Democratic candidate was lower than in both of President Obama’s elections, and closer to the level achieved by Bill Clinton in his successful 1996 campaign. 

As can be seen in the chart below, the differences among white youth and those of color were stark. This confirmed much of the analysis in CIRCLE’s 2016 Millennial Poll Analysis conducted before the election.


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