2021 College National Week of Deliberation | Elections: How Should We Encourage and Safeguard Voting?

Please join us for the Fall 2021 National Week of Deliberation online deliberative forum using Common Ground for Action (CGA) on Friday November 5, 2021 at 3:00pm EST/12:00pm PST on “Elections: How Should We Encourage and Safeguard Voting?"

The College National Week of Deliberation CGA college forum series connects college students from across the country to discuss and make choices together about today's most pressing, wicked issues. As more campuses become ideological bubbles, this initiative hopes to give students a space to talk across geographic and ideological divides to see what common ground we have ecto act on wicked issues.

Overiew of “Elections: How Should We Encourage and Safeguard Voting?"

 Many Americans are concerned about the US election system although we don’t always agree on the main problem or how best to fix it. Is it too hard to vote? Is the system too easy to manipulate? Do we have rules that make voting fair and accessible to all? Are we doing enough to ensure accuracy and credibility?

This issue advisory presents three options for moving forward, each reflecting a different view of the problem and each suggesting a different set of ideas about what should be done. Most people will find something to agree with in all three approaches, but each also has trade-offs, risks, or drawbacks that need to be taken into account and worked through.

In thinking about different approaches, we will consider these questions:

• Would having uniform national standards for voting, instead of having state and local officials continue to set the rules, give us more confidence?
• Do ID requirements for voting, in order to help maintain the system’s integrity, merely discourage voters by placing hurdles in their way?
• Would Americans see the voting system as more legitimate if the Electoral College were eliminated in favor of a national popular vote?
• Could some of the changes proposed here have unintended consequences? Could they fix some problems but cause new ones we haven’t anticipated?

In our 90 minute forum, we will discuss these three options for action:

Option 1: Make it easier to register to vote. 

Option 2: Do more to make elections secure.

Option 3: Offer more and better choices.

Check out the issue guide here for more information: https://www.nifi.org/sites/default/files/product-downloads/Elections%20Issue%20Advisory_0.pdf