National Voter Registration Day will be observed throughout West Virginia on Tuesday, September 28th.
According to WV Secretary of State Mac Warner, National Voter Registration Day (NVRD) is a nonpartisan civic holiday celebrated on the fourth Tuesday of September. The purpose of NVRD is to create attention and interest in not only voter registration but also reminding citizens to keep their voter registration updated.
NVRD was first observed in 2012. NVRD is part of National Voter Registration Month (September) started initially by the National Association of Secretaries of State.
The WV Secretary of State’s Office and the state’s 55 county clerks have been active promoting voter registration throughout the month of September. By the end of the month, Secretary of State Mac Warner will have visited more than 30 counties and nearly two dozen high schools.
Secretary Warner has also used the month of September to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the passage of the 26th Amendment that reduced the voting age from 21 to 18. The late U.S. Senator Jennings Randolph of West Virginia is considered the “Father of the 26th Amendment.” The first 18-year-old to register to vote in 1972 was Ella Mae Thompson Haddix, now a retired school teacher living in Randolph County.
“The first step to participating in our democracy is being registered to vote,” said Secretary Warner. “If we can encourage eligible voters to register when they’re young, they are more likely to participate regularly in our election process.”
During his first four-year term in office, Secretary Warner and the county clerks have registered 255,888 citizens to vote. More than 67,000 of those new registrations were high school students from throughout the state. West Virginia currently has 1,124,195 eligible citizens registered to vote.
Warner said that eligible voters can now register to vote online anytime by going to a secure website at www.GoVoteWV.com. You can also visit your county clerk’s office to register in person.
“In West Virginia, we encourage citizens not to wait until election time to register to vote. Register now. If you need to update your voter registration, you can also do that right now online,” Warner said.
To celebrate National Voter Registration Day on Tuesday (Sept. 28), Secretary Warner will be visiting high schools in Kanawha County (St. Albans High School) and Putnam County (Buffalo and Winfield High Schools). He will be joined by Kanawha County Clerk Vera McCormick and Putnam County Clerk Brian Wood.
