Battleground states see waves of new voters sign up who could sway 2024 race

(This story has been updated to note Arizona's electorate grew by nearly 125,000 voters from between August of 2020 to the end of July 2024.)

WASHINGTON – Recent spikes in voter registrations are shaking up the already contentious 2024 presidential race, with hundreds of thousands of new voters now signed up to cast ballots and help determine who resides in the White House for the next four years.

In the majority of the seven key battleground states where Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris are particularly close in the polls, the current number of registered voters is up compared with the 2020 presidential contest that coincided with the COVID-19 global pandemic.

North Carolina, as one example, boasts nearly a half million more registered people in 2024 compared with 2020, when Trump eked out a win over Joe Biden in the Tar Heel State by about 74,000 votes.

Over in Michigan, the total count of registered voters has grown by more than 350,000 since October of 2020. Biden's margin of victory that year over Trump in the midwestern battleground state: a little more than 150,000 votes.

Similar voter registration trends are also playing out in Arizona, where Biden bested Trump in 2020 by about 10,500 votes, and Nevada, where the current Democratic president beat his predecessor by nearly 33,600 votes. Between August 2020 and the end of July this year, the Arizona electorate grew by nearly 125,000 voters. In Nevada ? the least populated of this year's swing states ? more than 260,000 additional registered voters have signed up compared with this time four years ago.

There's an important caveat to this data: Registered voters are not the same thing as actual voters, which is why the Trump and Harris campaigns are focused heading into November on driving up turnout among their core constituencies while also finding potential new pockets of supporters.

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The surge in names that have been added to the voter rolls happens for a variety of reasons. For one, more than 8 million people across the U.S. are newly eligible to vote upon reaching their 18th birthday since the last mid-election cycle in 2022, according to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts University. On top of that, election experts told USA TODAY that several specific recent events – including Biden's decision to stand down in place of Harris and a particular high-profile celebrity endorsement – could be motivating factors behind many of the new registrations.

Michael McDonald, a professor of political science at the University of Florida, said that voter registrations reliably increase every campaign season as Election Day nears, especially during events such a national political convention.

“What's different this year,” he said, “is we're seeing a different campaign event.”

Major moments lead to major voting interest

A tumultuous summer in politics culminated in Biden’s late July decision to drop out of the presidential race and throw his support behind Harris, his incumbent vice president.

Harris' campaign kickoff roused a flood of donations, refreshed enthusiasm among liberal voters and seemingly launched a surge of voter registrations. In the 48 hours that followed Harris taking over, nearly 39,000 people registered to vote, according to the nonpartisan platform Vote.org. Less than a week after that, the number surpassed 100,000.

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Then came pop icon Taylor Swift’s endorsement of Harris via Instagram. Her post, which garnered more than 11 million likes and followed right after Harris’ Sept. 10 debate with Trump, included a custom URL to voting resources and a call for fans to get registered.

Vote.gov received 405,999 visitors in the 24 hours following Swift’s announcement, according to a General Services Administration spokesperson. In comparison, the website had about 30,000 daily visitors in the week prior.

It was unclear how many of these visitors successfully registered. Vote.gov itself is not a registration page but directs users to websites with state-specific information.

Swing states could see more voters in 2024

During National Voter Registration Day on Sept. 17, Vote.org reported registering more than 150,000 new voters, a record for the organization during the annual civic holiday.

Sixteen percent of those came from the seven key swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

North Carolina had one of the largest jumps in total registered voters between now and this time four years ago, with more than 500,000 additional voters, according to the North Carolina State Board of Elections. In 2020, Trump narrowly won the Tar Heel State's 15 Electoral College votes.

In Pennsylvania, the current number of registered voters is about 150,000 less compared with Election Day in 2020, when Biden won the commonwealth by about 80,500 votes. But there are already about 60,000 more voters in the state as of late September than there were during the 2022 midterm elections, when Democrats won critical and closely contended races for governor and the U.S. Senate.

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The handful of battleground states emerged as the ones to watch given their neck-and-neck numbers of Republicans and Democrats, which puts each in the position to tip the scales for either Trump or Harris. The Trump campaign recently told Fox News they have put "maximum attention and resources" into boosting Republican registrations in these states.

"And in states where the winner will be decided by mere percentage points, it could make all the difference," Trump campaign senior adviser Tim Murtaugh said.

Efforts by the Trump campaign and GOP allies appear to be paying off: In all four swing states where voters register by party, Republicans have grown their share of voters since 2020. In Arizona, Republicans have extended their lead over Democrats, with nearly 260,000 more red than blue registered voters. And in North Carolina, Nevada and Pennsylvania, Republicans have cut significantly into the Democratic advantage.

'Shot in the arm' for Democrats

Across the board, voter growth isn’t limited to the battlegrounds.

Nationwide, the number of voters registering in late July following Harris’ ascension were as much as triple that compared to the same time four years ago, said Tom Bonier, Democratic strategist and CEO of political data provider TargetSmart.

Many of the new registrants, he said, have been younger voters and more specifically, younger women and younger women of color.

His best comparison: The summer of 2022, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the case that made abortion legal nationwide.

"At the time we saw that and thought, ‘Wow, you'll never see anything like this again. We haven't seen anything like it before,’” Bonier said.

Bonier said numbers from this summer, though, exceeded what they witnessed then.

The potential influx of new voters from these certain demographics could be a boon for Democrats, who tend to score well with voters under 35 and, prior to the Biden-Harris ticket shake-up, were being largely outpaced by Republicans in terms of registrations, McDonald said.

“Democrats have needed to get this shot in the arm,” he said. “Harris' entry provided the opportunity for people to become enthused and start registering.”

Owen Wallace, 18, is among more than 3.5 million voters registered in Wisconsin, which as of the start of this month is up by about 27,000 since 2020, according to the Wisconsin Elections Commission.

A freshman studying data science at the University of Utah, Wallace registered to vote for the first time in July. He said he was inspired by a high school government class, along with participation in the event, America in One Room: The Youth Vote, which gathered hundreds of first-time voters together in Washington, D.C., for a weekend this summer.

Wallace said he plans to vote absentee in his home state of Wisconsin and cast his ballot for Harris.

While the college freshman opted to register just ahead of Biden’s surprise exit, Wallace said the decision reaffirmed his determination to vote this fall.

“It was sort of a reinvigoration of hope,” he said.

Turnout remains a question and concern

Still for many, registration does not automatically equal participation.

Out of the nearly 7 million Georgia residents registered to vote in 2022, around 4 million actually cast a ballot.

'You have no choice': Trump urges voters who don't like him to consider the alternative

The numbers do improve in presidential years, though.

Of the more than 8 million Michiganders registered to vote in 2020, approximately 5.5 million turned out. In Pennsylvania that year, about 9 million people were registered and almost 7 million cast a vote.

"The election will be won by those who show up, and that’s where the ground game comes in," Murtaugh, of the Trump campaign, told Fox News.

McDonald said he expects poll numbers this November to likewise reflect growing engagement and enthusiasm.

“People who register between now and Election Day, they are doing so with an intention to vote,” McDonald said.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: In swing states, voter registrations surge, shaking up 2024 race