March for our Lives protesters holding a '2020 Voter' sign in Washington, D.C.

Phil Roeder/Flickr (CC-BY) Remix by Samantha Grasso

Parkland students have already effected change at the polls

These survivors are changing Florida's political landscape.

Photo of Samantha Grasso 

Samantha Grasso

IRL

Posted on Aug 29, 2018   Updated on May 21, 2021, 7:42 am CDT

Six months after their school lost 17 students and teachers in a Valentine’s Day shooting, the efforts of Parkland, Florida, students to change the state’s political landscape are being put to the test. And according to last night’s primary elections, the teenagers who reinvigorated the gun control debate are winning.

Parkland activist David Hogg, speaking to the Washington Post, said that many of the young people he knows were excited by Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum, who bested a former Congressman to win the Democratic nomination for governor of Florida.

And on a local level, Lori Alhadeff, whose daughter Alyssa was killed in the shooting, was elected to the Broward County School Board. Alhadeff said she was inspired by her daughter’s death to “be the voice of change.”

Hogg said that Tuesday’s results suggested that voter turnout may be shifting, particularly with the help of the elimination of a Republican-imposed ban on college campus early voting.

Across Twitter, survivors of the Parkland shooting have shared photos of their “I Voted” stickers, the first electoral efforts for many of them.

https://twitter.com/Jose_Iglesiass/status/1034454731488468992

According to Time reporter Charlotte Alter, youth voter registration has increased 41 percent since the Parkland shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Additionally, data from Democratic firm TargetSmart published in July showed that registration rates for people under 30 “increased significantly” in swing states over the past seven months. More specifically, prior to the Parkland shooting, voters 18 to 29 years old were a part of 26 percent of new voter registrations in Florida. Since then, that number has increased nearly 8 percentage points.

https://twitter.com/CharlotteAlter/status/1034662752839782401

The Sun Sentinel reported that voter turnout for all three South Florida counties, including Parkland’s Broward County, was higher than in the last non-presidential primary. In Broward, voter turnout exceeded the 2014 primary by just under 11 percent. Brenda Snipes, Broward’s elections supervisor, attributed the spike to “greater voter energy and enthusiasm.”

Two hours before its polls closed, Orange County broke the record for primary voter turnout with 22 percent, Click Orlando reported. By the time polls closed, the county set a new record with nearly 25 percent, compared to the almost 19 percent primary voter turnout it saw in 2016, and 16 percent turnout in 2014.

Several other reporters tweeted similar findings in other Florida counties on Tuesday night.

“We as young people will win not by using hate, not by using division,” Hogg said. “It’s about campaigning and voting.”

Correction, 10:39am CT: A spelling error in this article’s on-site headline has been corrected.

H/T Washington Post, Axios

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*First Published: Aug 29, 2018, 9:36 am CDT

Samantha Grasso

Samantha Grasso is a former IRL staff writer for the Daily Dot with a reporting emphasis on immigration. Her work has appeared on AJ+, Vox, Splinter, Los Angeles Magazine, and Austin Monthly.

Samantha Grasso