UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN River Falls

Community Engagement Indicators

Voter Turnout

voter-turnout-2022

  • Minnesota and Wisconsin are generally among the top states in the US in terms of voter turnout, having the same voter turnout (57.1%) in the 2022 election.
  • Voter turnout in Pierce and Polk Counties was lower than in the other jurisdictions in 2022.
  • In Washington and St. Croix counties, more than six in ten eligible voters cast their ballots in the off-year election of 2022.

voter-turnout-wi-2022

  • As expected, voter turnout is much higher in years in which there is a presidential contest (2004, 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2020) than in so-called “off-year” elections, with the latest presidential election (2020) having a substantially higher turnout than previous elections.
  • There was much greater dispersion among counties in the voter turnout in 2020, and a much higher difference between the highest turnout county (St. Croix) and the lower turnout county (Pierce).
  • Voter turnout in 2018 and 2022 was substantially higher than in other non-presidential election years, indicating that overall voter turnout seems to be trending upwards.
     

voter-turnout-mn-2022

  • Voter turnout is much lower in non-presidential election years (2006, 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022).
  • Washington County consistently has a higher rate of voter turnout than the State of Minnesota.
  • The rate of voter turnout in all three jurisdictions was trending downward until the 2020 presidential election, which had a significantly higher voter turnout compared to other elections in the period.
     

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