As the presidential candidates gear up for tonight’s highly anticipated debate, many eyes are on a fraction of the electorate that some say may decide the 2008 election: independent voters.
Declining to affiliate oneself with a political party is a growing trend, according to several polls.
In 2006, 18.3 percent of registered voters in the state of California declined to declare a political party, close to double the 10.3 percent independent rate just 12 years prior in 1994, according to a poll by the California Secretary of State.
This number is even greater nationwide, as CNN’s exit polling after the 2004 national election found that 26 percent of voters had registered as “decline to state.”
Matthew Baum, a professor of public policy at Harvard University, said that the influx of officially independent voters has been inspired more by a distaste for party association than by an actual desire to vote for different candidates.
“The large majority of voters that call themselves independent are consistent voters for certain parties,” he said. “Ten to 15 percent (of the electorate) are independent in a real sense, meaning that their votes vary with regularity.”
Baum noted that though the demographics of truly independent voters have not changed as much as registration rolls may indicate, the younger generation does tend to hold party loyalty less strongly.
“There’s a generational difference in the loyalty to parties, identifying with the parties. It’s more en vogue to not identify with a party,” he noted, adding that it is only party affiliations, and not ideological divisions, that have been disappearing among the new generation of independents.
Jack Citrin, a professor of political science at UC Berkeley, said that some college students are becoming more jaded about the two-party political system.
“There’s been a kind of cynicism about party politics and this tends to be strong among young people,” he said. “The word (independent) has a positive leaning. I’m independent, I make up my mind. I’m not rigid or tied down.”
Some UCLA students registered as independent agreed that they chose to decline party association because they feel they cannot support either of the two main parties entirely.
“I don’t think that either one is capable of making changes,” said Heather Boberg, a third-year history student, who is independent but plans to vote for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. “If you’re independent, you have more freedom to look at (candidates) instead of (voting) based on a party.”
Baum said that the rise in decline-to-state voters is based on a number of factors, most of which are tied to economic distress. Independent voters are often disinterested and inactive in the political sphere, Citrin said.
“Independents as a group are less interested in politics,” he said. “They’re less issue-oriented. They pay less attention to the campaign early on.”
Some students who are still undecided about their decision said that the candidate they choose must exhibit certain characteristics.
“All I’m looking for is the level of sincerity you can see from them, not the child play and he-said-this, devil’s advocate stuff,” said Maria Calderon, a first-year microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics student.
The influx of voters registering as independent has helped shape the campaign strategies of both John McCain and Barack Obama, their spokespeople said.
“We’re using every avenue possible to reach independent voters in this election cycle,” said Rick Gorka, a regional spokesman for the McCain campaign, adding that the campaign has made efforts to appeal to youthful voters who are undecided about which candidate to endorse.
“We reach out to students through various campus networks (and) through youth and student coalitions,” he said.
The Obama campaign has similarly attempted to engage the young electorate in hopes of swaying independent voters, said Obama spokesman Gabriel Sanchez.
“They may not necessarily vote for a particular party, but they vote for a candidate,” Sanchez said, adding that the campaign also hopes to gain on the fact that the Democratic Party allowed independent voters to participate in their primaries.
Students agreed that understanding where candidates stand on the issues is the key to making an educated choice.
Kaitlin Korona, a first-year nursing student, said that she is still undecided but is leaning towards McCain because of his platforms on foreign policy, economic concerns and social issues, which she said are the most important to her. A self-professed political junkie, she said that she hopes her fellow students research the stances of the candidates before forming their opinions.
“I think if a lot of people read (candidates’) policies instead of watching whatever-channel news or listening to what their friends say, they’d be better off,” she said.