Voter Participation Center works to register underrepresented Arkansans

(KUAF)– Matthew Moore: There aren’t major elections in 2025 in Arkansas, but for the Voter Participation Center, there’s no wrong time to register eligible voters.

Tom Lopach is the president and CEO of the nonprofit organization. And he says they’ve been working in states across America since 2003 to get people registered to vote through the use of direct mail and digital content and underrepresented communities.

Lopach: So what we do is we will send voter registration forms to people of color, young people and unmarried women to help increase their registration and participation in our democracy. And why those demographics, specifically those three demographics, are all deeply underrepresented in our electorate. When you look nationwide, there are 72 million Americans that are eligible to vote and unregistered. Of those 72 million, 51 million are people of color, young people and unmarried women. That’s about 71 percent. That number always blows my hair back. When you look in Arkansas, specifically in the communities that we serve. Again, people of color, young people and unmarried women, 42 percent are unregistered. When you look at the other populations, 27 percent are unregistered. So you can see there’s a pretty significant delta in voter registration and also in turnout.

Moore: Voter registration laws vary across every state. This is something you’re very familiar with. How does your work change depending on the state that you’re involved in?

Lopach: So we pay very careful attention to each state’s laws as they relate to voter registration. Vote by mail, sign up and get out the vote. So we have to pay attention to 50 different states. Do they have online voter registration? Do they not? Do they require identification to register? We follow all of those laws and then we tailor our programs to meet the specific laws in each state. Many states use their own voter registration form. Other states use the national voter registration form. So we stay in touch with the election administration offices in each state to make sure we’re complying with their laws and using the appropriate form.

Moore: What does your work look like specifically in Arkansas?

Lopach: In Arkansas, this time, we’ll be sending about 55,000 pieces of mail to unregistered Arkansans. We also make sure that we have reply envelopes that go back to the local or county election office. So once a person signs and dates their form, they can put it in the postage-paid envelope we provide, and it gets back to the local election administrator. The other thing that we do, both in Arkansas and nationally, is we will pre-fill voter registration application form with the recipient’s name and address. So all they really have to do is check the information, sign it, date it, and send it back in the postage-paid envelope.