Election Issue 2024
Read our coverage of the 2024 Presidential Election
The independent newspaper of Washington University in St. Louis
After president-elect Donald Trump secured a decisive victory in the presidential election on Tuesday night, many WashU students came to campus the next day grappling with the news and processing a wide range of emotions. For some, Wednesday was a celebration of a strong showing by Trump. But for many students on WashU’s predominantly Democratic campus, the day was marked by sadness, fear, and uncertainty about the future of the country.
Over the summer of 2024, then-rising-junior Kayleigh Hernandez was confronted with a notification that shocked her: She had an outstanding balance of $50,000 owed to WashU. As a first-generation, low-income (FGLI) student, Hernandez normally paid a greatly reduced tuition that ranged in the hundreds of dollars.
Seven minutes past 7 p.m., a gaggle of students sporting “I Voted” stickers and camouflage print “Harris-Waltz” hats milled around Seigle 103, waiting for the WashU College Democrats election night watch party to commence. The nervous energy radiating off the group was palpable, cut briefly as WashU Democrats’ President, senior Saish Satyal, pushed through the crowd with a plentiful bounty of Domino’s pizza boxes stacked high in his arms. The watchers expected a night of community, come commiseration or celebration.
Just over 2,000 people voted in the 2024 election across two polling locations on WashU’s Danforth and Medical Campuses, with the largest voter turnout in history, per the Gephardt Institute for Civic and Community Engagement. This election was the first time that the Medical Campus served as a voting location, with 486 people casting ballots there. Turnout at the Danforth Campus polling location was 1,479, increasing by 38.4% compared to 1,156 voters in the 2020 presidential election.
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