During the 2012 presidential election, Utah was the third worst state for voter representation, according to an analysis by the financial company WalletHub.
The company looked at the percentage of voter representation by gender, race and age. Compared to other states, Utah was just as good if not better than other most states in its representation of gender. But the state struggled in its voter representation of age, and was ranked even worse in its representation of race.
“Whites are very much overrepresented, and in terms of age, older folks are much more represented than younger folks,” said Jill Gonzalez, an analyst for the company.
Gonzalez said it will be interesting to see if the representation changes at the polls this November.
“I think this year is going to look very different. We now have a female candidate that might sway things,” she said. “As far as race goes, whites are a little bit more represented. This year I think we’ll see an increase in the Hispanic vote. And finally, age could be very interesting because so many millennials were big fans of Bernie Sanders. I think it will be interesting to see if, A, they show up at the polls at all, or B, vote for one of these candidates.”
Nationwide in 2012, slightly more women voted than men, whites and African Americans were overrepresented while Hispanics, Asians and other ethnic groups were underrepresented, and the majority of voters were older than 35.
