Sept. 21, 2004

Voting Efforts Heat Up, Plotkin Advocates DC Rights

WTOP Host Addresses Freshmen as “GW Votes” Closes in on Registration Goal

By Greg Licamele

GW Votes plans to increase its outreach efforts in the final days before the Oct. 1 deadline to register voters. With the launch of its new Web site at www.GWVotes.org, students, faculty and staff have an on-campus resource to register to vote in the Nov. 2 presidential and local contests.

“I expect the same kind of spirit and effectiveness that GW Votes accomplished in the spring,” said Bernard Demczuk, assistant vice president for government affairs. “We’re looking to find every student who is not registered to vote, and that means going door-to-door. You have to go to the people.”

The new Web site includes information about how to request ballots for each state, where to send them and general information about GW Votes and the candidates.

While GW Votes does not endorse any party affiliation or urge students, faculty or staff to vote in DC rather than in their home states, Demczuk said he encourages people to vote where they live.

“We’ve taken the principle of non-partisan or parochial angles,” Demczuk said. “However, I do encourage people to register to vote where they live. That’s where their political clout is in protecting their rights.”

GW Votes is a Student Association initiative that also is sponsored by Program Board, Class Council, Jewish Student Association, Student Alliance for Israel, Alpha Phi, Alpha Epsilon Pi, GW’s branch of National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Residence Hall Association, College Democrats and College Republicans.

Demczuk said 90 percent of the undergraduate population is registered. He cited a successful campaign at Colonial Inauguration this summer that reached out to incoming freshmen from the moment they arrived at GW.

Incoming freshmen heard about their new city and its voting rights from WTOP political analyst Mark Plotkin, BA ’69, at Freshman Convocation. Plotkin, who said he personally believes in statehood for the District, asked students to get involved in the political process in Washington.

“Even though you’re just a student here for four years, you should be insulted that you are deprived and denied the rights that every other American just takes for granted,” said Plotkin of DC’s lack of congressional representation. “Not only should you be insulted, I want you to do something about it. I want you to change the political climate of this place. We’re far too appropriate. We’re far too accommodating. We’re far too accepting. They’re insulting you and excluding you from democracy.”

Plotkin said that while DC contributes three electoral votes in presidential contests, citizens elsewhere in the country have voices in Congress to represent them every day of the year.

“We are the only residents of a capital in the world that denies their own residents a vote in the national legislature,” Plotkin said.

Send feedback to: bygeorge@gwu.edu

Related Link

GW Votes