A new survey from Rice University’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research finds that 6 in 10 eligible voters in Harris County plan to participate in the November 2024 election — figures on par with past presidential election turnout (58.4% in 2016 and 65.9% in 2020, respectively).
The report, published online today, also revealed that while most voters are confident in an accurate vote count, significant proportions are not, and nearly half of those surveyed fear unrest and violence following Election Day.
Survey findings also showed that Hispanic (51%), young adult (48%) and independent voters (47%) are least likely to say they are going to cast a ballot. Likely voting also differed across neighborhoods with nearly 9 in 10 eligible voters in The Heights and Lazybrook areas being certain they will vote compared to 4 in 10 in the East Little York, Pasadena and Hobby areas.
Daniel Potter, director of the Kinder Institute’s Houston Population Research Center and the report’s lead author, said previous research shows that a person’s intention to vote is one of the strongest predictors of actual voting behavior.
“Asking about who intends to vote is a reliable way to anticipate who will participate, and it’s why we wanted to conduct this survey,” Potter said.
He said the low numbers among Hispanic, young adult and independent voters suggest these groups would benefit from additional attention to increase their engagement in the political process. In addition, some neighborhood areas where less than 50% said they would vote would benefit from voter engagement efforts as well.
“It’s striking that the groups that we perennially hear about being pivotal in elections — Hispanics, independents and young people — were the least likely to say they were going to vote,” he said. “There is such huge untapped potential there despite the best efforts of many organizations to find and motivate those voters to the polls.”
While most eligible voters said they feel at least moderately confident that votes will be counted accurately in Harris County and around the country, about 1 in 3 Harris County voters are not confident that vote counts will be accurate across the country. Among Republicans in Harris County, half are not confident in an accurate national count.
The majority of both parties said they were very worried about inaccurate election information, although more eligible Democratic voters (63%) felt this way than Republican voters (50%). A third of eligible voters said they were very concerned about restrictive voting laws, and more than half were very concerned about inaccurate election information and candidates or their supporters not accepting the results.
The survey was conducted in July and August 2024 as part of the Greater Houston Community Panel and is online here.