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Internet Campaign Aims To Get Young People To Vote

An effort to get young people to vote in the upcoming November election is getting a lot of attention thanks to one public service announcement.

Similar to the Rock the Vote campaign — which encouraged young people to vote — there's now  Knock the Vote. It's the same premise: get young people to the polls. And one way to do that is to make them mad by using PSAs like Don’t Vote. But will it resonate? Louis Moses is the founder of Moses Inc, a Valley based ad agency.

"Arizona is becoming an independent state. I think there is probably more registered independent voters now than either Republicans or Democrats, so I think the next generation is looking for some new leaders," he said.

Alec Beckett, creative director at NAIL Communications, is one of people behind the PSA.

"Because there have been 25 years of sort of failed efforts to get young voters energized and out to vote. So it occurred to us maybe getting them mad might do the trick," Beckett said.

Beckett says reaction has been positive. It’s also been wide-reaching. Talk Show host Ellen DeGeneres re-tweeted the PSA to her 77 million followers saying, “If you’re a millennial and this offends you, then my work is done. Now make sure you’re registered to vote.”

Of course, not everyone feels like Ellen.

"There have been a few people who have claimed that it’s kind of an ageist approach," Beckett said.

But Dana Marie Kennedy, who is the state director for AARP Arizona, isn’t worried.

"I think they pushed the envelope in a creative way to really show younger people a lot is at stake in this election and if they don’t vote, other people will be making decisions for them because they’re not weighing in," she explained.

A new survey by the Public Religion Research Institute and The Atlantic found only 35 percent of 18-to-29-year-olds are “absolutely certain” they’ll vote.

Beckett joined The Show to talk about the ad campaign.

KJZZ senior field correspondent Kathy Ritchie has 20 years of experience reporting and writing stories for national and local media outlets — nearly a decade of it has been spent in public media.