Voters Report Lower Satisfaction While Motivation to Vote Remains High
December 14, 2022 - The results of U.S. Vote Foundation’s 2022 Midterm Election Voter Experience survey have been released and show a continued and significant interest in voting and highlight how well voting processes have fared despite concerted efforts by a small minority to undermine the integrity of our elections.
"The turnout for the November 8, 2022 election changed our concept of how midterm elections might affect the administration and party in power and demonstrated that American voters can sustain interest during non-presidential election years," said Susan Dzieduszycka-Suinat, President and CEO, U.S. Vote Foundation. That turnout highlighted a nationwide understanding of the significance of these elections in ways that were once thought to be only reserved for quadrennial presidential elections.
See U.S. Vote Foundation’s 2022 Midterm Post-Election Voter Experience Survey Report
The three dominant themes that emerge from the survey reflect this sense of overall success, even if there were some problems:
- Voters were highly motivated to vote
- Voters’ satisfaction with their method of voting was lower than reported in the US Vote 2020 survey
- Nonetheless, the majority of respondents felt that the experience of voting was “easy”
Motivation to Vote Remains High
While the motivation to vote came in at a record-setting high of 98% in the 2020 General Election Survey, the 96% positive satisfaction rate reported by respondents in the 2022 survey meant that this motivation remained in place. This is further evidence of a trend, also noted in the 2018 Midterm Election survey, of voters becoming more engaged during non-presidential year elections, which historically have been characterized by relatively low turnouts. The relatively high numbers in this most recent election augur well for a repeat in 2024 of the record voter turnout we saw in the 2020 General Election.
Satisfaction is Down by 5% Across Voting Methods
The way voters chose to cast their ballots and their satisfaction with that choice produced some noticeable changes between the 2020 General Election survey results and the 2022 Midterm survey.
Overall, voter satisfaction with the voting experience dropped an average of 5% relative to the 2020 election. Of the domestic respondents who voted by absentee ballot (or vote-by-mail), 90% reported a high level of satisfaction in 2022, down from 94% in 2020. Similarly, only 80% of overseas absentee voters reported a high level of satisfaction in this recent election, down from the 85% who reported being highly satisfied with their method of voting in 2022. Voters who cast their ballots In-person at a polling place also claimed to be less satisfied: Only 87% indicated a high level of satisfaction in 2022 versus 93% in 2020.
For further information, please see U.S. Vote Foundation’s 2022 Midterm Post-Election Voter Experience Survey Report.