Today we’re sharing a guest article co-authored by Dakota Hall, Executive Director of the Alliance for Youth Organizing, and Leela Strong, Newhouse Director of the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University's Tisch College of Civic Life.
Together, they explore the connection between the March on Washington and the resilience of a generation who has inherited what they deem as a weakened version of the Voting Rights Act.
As the nation marks the anniversary of the historic 1963 March on Washington – coming just weeks after the 61st anniversary of the Voting Rights Act passed us by – a young voter stepping into the booth for the very first time this November was still learning to tie their shoes when the Supreme Court began unraveling the Voting Rights Act. They’ve never cast a ballot under the full protections the law once provided. Neither has anyone under 30. An entire generation has come of age in the gap between a promise made and a promise pared back.
That gap has widened twice in just over a decade. In 2013, Shelby County v. Holder eliminated the formula requiring federal oversight of jurisdictions with histories of discrimination, allowing them to quickly adopt restrictive voting laws and redraw district lines. This year, the Supreme Court’s ruling in Louisiana v. Callais stripped away the law’s last major enforcement tool, leaving it with little practical force just as voting maps criticized as discriminatory are being drawn nationwide.
The generation inheriting the crumbs of the Voting Rights Act is a large, powerful voting bloc: nearly 49 million young people, ages 18 to 29, will be eligible to vote in 2026 — including nearly 8.5 million who have aged into the electorate since the last presidential election. Nearly half (47%) are young people of color, a population directly affected when district lines are redrawn without federal guardrails in place.
Anyone would forgive this generation for walking away from the unfulfilled promise of democracy they are experiencing. But the data says they aren’t. In fact, they are engaged and looking to participate and make a change.
CIRCLE’s Youth Electoral Significance Index (YESI) ranks the races where young people have the greatest potential to shape outcomes, and this year’s rankings look nothing like the last cycle’s. Six of the top ten Senate races in this year’s index were not ranked at all two years ago.
Consider Maine. The state rocketed from the bottom of the 2024 Senate rankings list to the top of the nation this year, propelled by 60% youth turnout in 2024. The Sun Belt broke through in the Senate rankings as well, with Georgia and North Carolina — both unranked two years ago — sitting at #5 and #7, respectively, fueled by their large, diverse youth populations poised to vote in races that are routinely decided by a few percentage points. Texas now appears in the same list at #10. Wisconsin claimed the top spot among governor’s races. And Michigan holds the #1 House district for the second straight cycle, along with the #2 spot for Senate and #4 for governor.
But the very traits that put a state at the top of the index — young, educated, fast-growing, closely contested electorates — are the same traits that put communities at risk when district lines are redrawn without the Voting Rights Act’s protections standing guard. The places where young people hold the most power to affect election results are, disproportionately, the places where that power is easiest to dilute on a map. This is not a coincidence.
Just as telling is who’s missing from this year’s list. The index has never been a prediction of turnout or results. Montana, which ranked #1 for Senate in 2024, no longer appears in this year’s top ten as the underlying conditions shifted. That’s a reminder that youth electoral significance isn’t fixed. It changes from cycle to cycle, state by state.
Despite these shifts, young people continue to show up. In a national survey CIRCLE conducted this year with When We All Vote, 56% of young people said they are extremely likely to vote in 2026. For a midterm year, that’s not a bare majority; it’s a battle cry. That number is on par with youth polling just before the last presidential election, and only 13% say they are unlikely to vote at all. One in three participates precisely because they dislike how politics works and want to change it. This illustrates a generation daring and hoping for democracy to meet it halfway.
However, wanting to show up and being able to are two different things. Nearly three in five young people struggle to meet basic financial needs, and that strain follows them to the ballot box. When civil rights leaders organized the 1963 March on Washington, it was explicitly framed as a demand for both “Jobs and Freedom,” a recognition that economic survival and civil rights are inseparable. 63 years later, young Americans are grappling with many of the same core frustrations, balancing the fight for systemic justice against the daily grind of making ends meet. The proof is in the numbers: 62% of financially stable young people intend to vote, compared to 53% of those struggling to get by. Worrying about rent doesn’t make politics any less important, but it makes participating that much harder.
And let’s be honest: organizing cannot pay anyone’s rent, either. But it can help young people understand the connection between their economic lives and their civic lives. Across the country, youth-led grassroots organizations like the Alliance for Youth Organizing’s Network are helping build spaces that meet young people inside their actual reality, not some abstract civics lesson. The first conversation is about rent, the tight job market, and the healthcare bill they can’t afford. The conversation about the ballot box comes later, once the trust is built. When we show up for each other first, showing up to vote naturally follows. That is the work the Alliance’s youth organizers do every day in many of the very states topping CIRCLE’s rankings.
The other half of the equation is demonstrated in the rankings themselves: laws that lower the cost of participating, like online, same-day, automatic registration, are a major reason Maine sits at the top. We cannot keep counting on and expecting a generation’s participation every two years without passing laws that support it. If the law meant to protect the vote has been demolished, the least we can do is stop making the vote harder to cast.
63 years ago, Americans marched on the National Mall for a principle that now sounds almost radical: that economic dignity and the electorate belong to everyone, not just to whoever holds power when the maps get drawn. The laws won in that era have been whittled down to a hollow shell. But the electorate those marchers fought for arrived anyway – 49 million strong, diverse, and defiantly willing to show up. Lines can be redrawn. Protections can be gutted. But you cannot gerrymander a generation out of a democracy that already belongs to them.
Dakota Hall is a renowned national leader, organizer, and strategist with nearly a decade of experience in leading youth organizations and movements. With expertise in fundraising, organizational development, and campaign and organizing strategies, Dakota has made a significant impact on the landscape of youth civic engagement.
As the Executive Director of the Alliance for Youth Action and Alliance for Youth Organizing, Dakota oversees the largest grassroots youth organizing network in the United States. In this role, he provides strategic direction and support to a vast network of youth-led organizations across the country, empowering them to engage in effective advocacy, build power within their communities, and drive progressive change. His leadership fosters collaboration and innovation, ensuring that young organizers have the resources and guidance they need to succeed in their advocacy, base building, and civic engagement campaigns.
Leela Strong is the Newhouse Director of the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University’s Tisch College of Civic Life, which researches youth civic participation and informs advocates, educators, and policymakers on voting trends, civic education, and the policies affecting young people. Previously, as Global Director of Nike’s Made to Play initiative, she led philanthropic strategy that reached 1.3 million children in more than 40 countries. She holds a BA from Lafayette College and an MPH from Boston University.
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