With Election Day coming up and only 61.4% of the voting age population having voted in the 2016 presidential election and 53.4% in the 2018 midterm, the personal-finance website WalletHub today released its report on 2020’s Most & Least Politically Engaged States, as well as accompanying videos.
In order to determine where Americans are most involved in politics, WalletHub compared the 50 states across 11 key indicators of political engagement. They range from “percentage of registered voters in the 2016 presidential election” to “total political contributions per adult population.”
| Most Politically Engaged States | Least Politically Engaged States |
| 1. Maine | 41. Indiana |
| 2. Washington | 42. South Carolina |
| 3. Colorado | 43. South Dakota |
| 4. Maryland | 44. Kentucky |
| 5. Wyoming | 45. Tennessee |
| 6. Utah | 46. West Virginia |
| 7. Oregon | 47. Alabama |
| 8. Montana | 48. New Mexico |
| 9. Virginia | 49. Mississippi |
| 10. Massachusetts | 50. Hawaii |
Key Stats
- Maine has the highest share of citizens who actually voted in the 2016 presidential election, 72.68 percent, which is 1.5 times higher than in Hawaii, where the percentage is lowest at 47.27 percent.
- Maine has the highest share of citizens who actually voted in the 2018 midterm elections, 65.60 percent, which is 1.5 times higher than in Arkansas, where the percentage is lowest at 42.60 percent.
- There is a 0.6 correlation between the overall ranking of the states for political engagement and the level of education in each state (measured as the percentage of the population with at least a bachelor’s degree).
- Blue states are more politically engaged, with an average ranking of 18.20, compared with 30.37 for Red states (1 = Best).
To view the full report and your state’s ranking, please visit:
https://wallethub.com/edu/most-least-politically-engaged-states/7782/
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