It’s every U.S. citizen’s right to vote, but sometimes it can feel like a chore.
You’ve got to make sure you’re registered, find your polling location and stand in line. How to make voting more fun? Well, you could turn it into a party.
In metro Atlanta, several groups have hosted yoga sessions, dance parties, tailgates and roller skating events to encourage Georgians — and young people in particular — to get out and vote.
For Frida Simpson, 33, the activities are working. She attended a party hosted by Daybreaker, a group that puts on dance events across the country, at the High Museum of Art in Midtown on Saturday. After grabbing pizza and chatting, Simpson went inside the museum, which is one of Fulton County’s early voting locations. The process took just a few minutes.
“Everything’s set up for you. You have food, you’re going to meet new people,” she said. “I think this is just awesome.”
Georgia voters set a record of 1.4 million ballots cast during the first week of early voting. But with polling showing the presidential race in the state as still very close, both campaigns are trying everything to squeeze every vote out of their coalition as possible.
Martin Luther King III, the son of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King, told the crowd at the “Party to the Polls” event to “vote like we’ve never voted before.” Former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, who also spoke, said “the most important civic duty we have is casting our vote,” and he added, “keep the energy up.”
On Sunday, the nonpartisan group Joy to the Polls hosted a DJ set at the Mexican restaurant El Ponce, located in close proximity to the voting precinct at Joan P. Garner Library on Ponce de Leon Avenue.
“Voting is super important, and as a woman, especially this year, there’s a lot on the line,” said Rosa Thurnher, owner of El Ponce. She offered to host the event at her restaurant in the hopes it would “bring out young people and really get them excited.”
Joy to the Polls, which aims to motivate voters through pop-up concerts, also came to Georgia during the 2020 presidential election and during 2021 for the U.S. Senate runoffs. The group plans to travel around Atlanta on Election Day as well, and Flau’jae Johnson, a college basketball player and rapper, is set to perform.
Another entertainer with deep Atlanta roots, Usher, is also getting into the act.
Last week, a few days before he shared the stage with Vice President Kamala Harris at her rally at Lakewood Amphitheatre, the pop star skated around the historic, Black-owned Cascade skating rink for a “Roll to the Polls” voter turnout event.
“I’m asking each and every person here to make it their business to vote this year because it is very, very, very, very important,” he said, according to WXIA-TV. “We’ve got to do this. Can I get a yes from everybody here? Everybody here’s going to vote?”
Conservative-aligned organizations are reaching out to encourage Georgians to vote, too.
Former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy and political activist Charlie Kirk held a gathering Monday at Georgia State University as part of their “You’re Being Brainwashed” tour and signed voters up to join the Turning Point Action coalition, which has been supporting Donald Trump for president. The group held another event Tuesday at the University of Georgia.
The Trump campaign in Georgia has also been hosting voter registration and outreach events with UGA fraternities, campaign spokesperson Morgan Ackley said. They have registered out-of-state students in Georgia, enrolled Georgia students who were not previously registered and hosted a phone bank on behalf of Trump.
“They came and spoke about the Trump campaign and how to get more involved and the importance of voting,” said Michael O’Leary, a junior and member of the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity.
The individual outreach brought more awareness about the election to other fraternity members, he said.
“The presidential election will directly affect us after we graduate, when we’re adults in the real world working,” he said.
In addition to getting voters who may back Trump but rarely go to the polls, the campaign has also attempted to reach Black and Latino men who may be open to his message.
In June, before the CNN presidential debate in Atlanta, Black Republican legislators and a handful of Black business owners gathered at Rocky’s Barbershop in Buckhead. Trump called into the event by phone, boasting that support from Black voters was “through the roof.” (An Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll this week showed Trump’s support among Black Georgians at about 8%, although his opponent, Kamala Harris, is lagging behind the performance of other Democrats with the support of about 74% of the Black voters surveyed).
Some lawmakers are getting creative on how they emphasize what they see as the core issues in this election.
To mark World Menopause Day, U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams, state Sen. Elena Parent and state Rep. Michelle Au stood together in Decatur, in front of a 20-foot inflatable IUD named “Freeda,” and called for access to contraceptives throughout a woman’s life.
At the High Museum event, Charity Irby, 28, said this November marks her second election in Georgia.
“I just feel like this made me more excited to vote in Atlanta,” she said.
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