On the final stretch of this extremely tight election, Dominion held a mock election on October 23rd during advisory for students to get accustomed to what they should expect on the Virginia ballot. Overall, 50% of Dominion students responded to the Google Form pushed out to all with close to 700 responses to each question.
The president and vice president election was won by Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, receiving 48.8% of votes. Meanwhile, Donald J. Trump and J.D. Vance received 33.7% of the votes. Interestingly enough, 8.7% of the votes went towards write-ins which is a trend that continues through the ballot, receiving close to 10% of the votes. However, write-ins didn’t follow any specific trend or garner any significant amount of votes for a candidate.
In 2020 in the state of Virginia President Biden won 54% of the votes followed by Former President Trump receiving 44% of votes. Furthermore, in Loudoun County the breakdown was more divided with Biden winning 62% of the votes and 37% going for Trump.
Breaking down voting by age demographic, the mock Election mirrored the 2020 election. According to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement 50% of 18-29 year old voters nationwide voted, with that number at 56% in the state of Virginia.
The results of the presidential election are unsurprising though, many sources such as the Harvard youth poll and a study done by Pew Research Center indicate that a majority of young voters have historically casted their vote for the Democratic party. In a study done in 2008, among 18-29 year olds, 45% identified themselves as a Democrat, while only 26% identified as a Republican.
As a member of the United States Senate, Timothy M. Kaine of the Democratic party won with 56.9% of the votes, while Hung Cao of the Republican party only received 33.7% of the votes. In regards to the United States House of Representatives, Suhas Subramanyam of the Democratic party won with 53.1% of the votes, while Mike W. Clancy received 38.1% of the votes.
“[I voted for] Trump,” Kevin Lazo said. However, he was unsure about Trump or the other candidates. “I voted for Kamala Harris,” Aiden Clark said. “I just don’t want Trump to win, that’s just not gonna go over too well. I don’t know how much better Kamala is going to be, it’ll be somewhat better, at least there won’t be Project 2025.”
