This article was originally published in The Hoya.
The Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) led a get-out-the-vote campaign Oct. 10 in partnership with the League of Women Voters (LWV), a nonpartisan voting rights organization, to encourage students to vote in the upcoming November election.
GUSA President Jaden Cobb (CAS ’25) and Nile Blass (CAS ’22), a regional organizer for the LWV, provided voting information by tabling in Red Square, engaging students by giving out free LWV shirts and flyers, chips, energy drinks and cookies. Cobb and Blass asked students if they were registered to vote in advance of their state’s deadline and directed them to resources for absentee voting.
Cobb said this effort is part of GUSA’s mission to get more students engaged in off-campus issues.
“One of our initiatives this year is to make sure we’re not only taking care of our students on campus, but make sure we’re taking care of students on a more global scale,” Cobb told The Hoya. “We want to engage our constituents in the public atmosphere.”
Cobb added that the get-out-the-vote campaign, which is the first in GUSA’s history, was a key part of his own goal as GUSA president to uplift marginalized voices on campus by minimizing barriers to voting.
“One of the reasons I ran for GUSA president was because I felt like a lot of the communities lacked that voice that specifically they needed,” Cobb said. “While I can preach all of this talk on campus about making sure you vote in GUSA elections, make sure you hold the university accountable, make sure you create this community of inclusion, you also have to make sure you do it on a more national level and a more local level within your communities.”
Ajani Stella / The Hoya | The Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) partnered with the League of Women Voters (LWV), a nonpartisan voting rights organization, to promote student voting in the 2024 election in an Oct. 10 campaign.
Blass said the initiative was part of LWV’s ongoing effort to inspire more young people to become leaders and show them that their voice matters in politics.
“We want to provide young people with resources, leadership development and opportunities to put forward ideas,” Blass told The Hoya.
GUSA’s Senate set this year’s elections on Election Day, Nov. 5, to encourage more student participation in both on and off-campus elections.
GUSA’s campaign is the latest in a series of voter education initiatives this semester. GU Votes, a student-led group within the Georgetown University Institute of Politics and Public Service dedicated to voter engagement on campus, has tabled in Leo J. O’Donovan Dining Hall, dorm lobbies and Red Square, spoken in classrooms and lectures and been present at social events to encourage voting.
GU Votes co-president Sam Lovell (CAS ’25) said GU Votes has tried to be visible to as many students as possible on campus, partnering with organizations like The Corp, Lauinger Library and the Andrew Goodman Foundation, a youth-focused voting rights group, to reach more students.
“Really just being flexible, trying to meet the needs that have been expressed by the community, has been really our main objective, but also trying to expand in areas that we haven’t before,” Lovell told The Hoya.
Niamh Dempsey (CAS ’27), who stopped at the table, said while her home state of California made it easy to vote by mail, many of her friends have struggled with navigating red tape and finding postage and drop-off sites for absentee ballots.
“I think that having some way of people accessing stamps and knowing where they can submit their ballots would be super important,” Dempsey told The Hoya. “I don’t have time to walk to the post office, and all of these types of requirements make it more difficult to vote by mail.”
David Gibson (CAS ’28) said he appreciates Georgetown’s efforts to encourage voting and civic participation, especially as student organizations have reminded him to vote.
“As a citizen and government major, one of the biggest ways I can make an impact is through voting for my representatives,” Gibson wrote to The Hoya. “I would even recommend people that want to vote against me to go vote because it’s a civic duty.”
Lovell said he hopes civic engagement at Georgetown will encourage civil discourse and mitigate increasing political violence.
“I believe that we solve our differences with ballots not bullets,” Lovell said. “It’s really important that we’re encouraging people to participate in a way that’s nonviolent as the principle means to resolve our differences.”