Disability Turnout in 2016

In The Politics of Autism, I discuss the issue's role in presidential campaigns. As I explain in the book, Hillary Clinton has a long history with the issue. In the 2016 campaign, a number of posts discussed Trump's support for the discredited notion that vaccines cause autism. He also has a bad record on disability issues more generally.

Fact sheet: Disability and Voter Turnout in the 2016 Elections Lisa Schur and Douglas Kruse

Key points:

• 16.0 million people with disabilities reported voting in the November 2016 elections.

• The voter turnout rate of people with disabilities was 6 percentage points lower than that of people without disabilities. 

• Employed people with disabilities, however, were just as likely as employed people without disabilities to vote, suggesting that employment helps bring people with disabilities into mainstream political life. 

• The voter registration rate of people with disabilities was 2 percentage points lower than that of people without disabilities. The lower voter turnout was due both to a lower registration rate among people with disabilities, and to lower turnout among those who are registered. 

• If people with disabilities voted at the same rate as people without disabilities who have the same demographic characteristics, there would be about 2.2 million more voters. These figures are based on analysis of data from the federal government’s Current Population Survey Voting Supplement for November 2016. The computations were made using six disability questions introduced on the Current Population Survey in 2008. 

Note to political activists:  if you mobilize people with disabilities, you expand the electorate and you get different outcomes.