Manhattan High Young Democrats held their first event last week to encourage voter registration among 18-year-olds at Manhattan High.

They ran their booth with voter registration forms at lunch last week on Tuesday and Friday. Only a small percentage of the MHS student body can vote, so they weren’t expecting a large number of people. 

“We weren’t really expecting that we would get that many people,”  Communications director Ben Whitten said. “Just because the senior class probably… only has 50 or 60 people that can vote. And out of that group, you’re probably only going to have 20 maybe 30 kids that will vote. And those kids that will vote probably have already registered.”

Unfortunately, nobody registered, but Young Democrats still felt that their presence sent a good message. 

“It’s definitely disappointing to sit out there for a couple hours and not get anyone at all, but at the same time we weren’t really expecting that we would get that many people,” Young Whitten said. “Really, it was just a last minute attempt to get anyone else registered that may be interested. And though we didn’t get anyone, that’s okay, because we would have rather sat out there and not got anyone, then not have sat out there and missed someone.”

The voter registration deadline in Kansas is Oct 13 and anyone who will be 18 on Nov 3 can register. Mail in ballot requests — and you do need to request a ballot, they are not automatically sent in Kansas — are due by Oct 14. Manhattan holds early voting from Oct 14 to Nov 2. 

 “Youth voter turnout is always lower than it should be… and young people’s voices deserve to be heard [as much] as other people’s.” Young Democrats president Sam DeLong said. “Youth voices are the voices of the future. And we need that to be expressed in our political system.”