Throughout the semester, members of a group known as Akron Votes have roamed around campus registering student voters. Recently, it has been revealed that this group has been registering students incorrectly.
Several YikYak posts warned students of Akron Votes’ activity on campus and questioned the group’s origin and intentions.
According to Zach Graves, USG director of governmental affairs and co-chair of Kent State Votes, over 1,000 students registered with Akron Votes and an estimated 250 registrations are invalid.
“Issues that we were seeing included stuff like putting student IDs instead of social security numbers or driver’s license numbers,” Graves said. “We also saw wrong addresses being put on the address line for where you are registering.”
Additionally, the group was also spreading general misinformation regarding the ability to vote and the voting process. In a personal interaction with an Akron Votes canvasser, Graves was told he could not vote off campus unless he changed his off-campus address to his on-campus address.
Graves also confirmed that Akron Votes is a part of Second Street, a national voter registration group that sends canvassers across the country to assist with voter registration.
According to Graves, the group was not intentionally registering students incorrectly, and it was actually a lack of training. Akron Votes has since been given helpful resources and additional training.
“One of our members, Barbara Hipsman Springer from the League of Women Voters, made a little sheet to properly explain how to do registrations,” Graves said. “They’ve been retrained on the issue, so it’s been explained by their manager or the person that sent them out in the first place.”
Kent State Votes has been increasing its efforts to warn students of potential voter registration issues, by sending institutional messages through university housing and updating its website with voter registration information. Akron Votes has also partnered with Kent State Votes to right their wrongs; both groups are working together to create a list to reach out and assist students who may have been affected.
“The work that they’re doing is super important, getting more people engaged in the election ahead of the deadline, but we want to make sure that’s done correctly,” Graves said. “I think that the steps they’ve taken will get us there, but the next step is getting the spreadsheet filled out with who’s been affected, contacting them and then trying to make sure they’re all set to go cast their ballots.”
All students, no matter if they registered with Akron Votes or not, are encouraged to check their registration status online.
This is a developing story. Follow KentWired for more updates.
John Engoglia is a beat reporter. Contact him at [email protected].
