As Vice President Kamala Harris was campaigning to make history in her run for the White House, less than half of registered voters in Chicago’s Black wards voted in the November 5 presidential election, according to the latest data from the Chicago Board of Elections.
Most registered voters in Illinois went to the polls to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris.
Donald Trump won a second term in the General Election November 5. He beat Harris 277 electoral votes to her 224. He did not capture Illinois’ 19 electoral votes in his victory.
In Chicago’s 17 Black wards, only 49.75 percent of 519,743 voters in those wards went to the polls. The turnout was much lower than during the 2020 presidential race, where 66.87 percent of registered voters in Chicago’s Black wards cast their 258,573 ballots.
Before Election Day, election officials were optimistic with voter turnout numbers as voters in long lines waited hours to cast ballots at precincts across the city during Early Voting.
At the South Side YMCA in the 5th Ward, the wait was as long as three hours during the evening of November 4, the final day of Early Voting. About 200 people waited in a line that snaked around the facility’s parking lot. Though the polls opened at 6 a.m. on Election Day, some voters at the South Side YMCA arrived as early as 4 a.m.
One voter at the South Side YMCA, Monique O’Neill-Strode, said the day before Election Day, she tried to vote at the Whitney Young Chicago Public Library branch in Chatham, but the lines were too long.
Election data show that of the 17 Black wards, about 11 had voter turnout percentages below 50 percent.
The 16th ward had the lowest voter turnout in the entire city, with just over 35 percent of that ward’s 24,660 voters going to the polls. That means just 8,784 registered voters in the 16th ward cast their ballots on November 5.
Despite the lackluster showing, the Black voter turnout this year was higher than Chicago citywide, where 63 percent of the city’s 1.5 million registered voters went to the polls.
Among the Black wards, the 5th Ward had the highest voter turnout, with over 70 percent of the ward’s 24,938 registered voters going to the polls. The second highest voter turnout among the Black wards came from the 4th Ward, where over 63 percent of that ward’s 28,889 registered voters went to the polls. The 27th Ward had the third highest voter turnout percentage with nearly 57 percent of that ward’s 35,822 voters going to the polls.
The 8th, 18th and 29th wards were the other wards that had voter turnout percentages over 50 percent.
The Chicago ward with the highest voter turnout in the entire city was the 44th Ward on the North Side, where over 81 percent of its 32,459 registered voters cast their ballots.
Among age groups, young voters in Chicago had the highest voter turnout, in an unprecedented move. Voters aged 25 to 34 had the highest turnout with 206,704 casting their ballots. Voters aged 35 to 44 had the second highest turnout with 169,946 going to the polls. The third highest turnout came from voters between 55 to 64 years old. That age group cast 145,234 ballots.
Voters 45 to 54 years old had the fourth highest turnout with 142,111 ballots cast. And voters between 65 to 74 years old had the fifth highest at 125,273 ballots cast.
The age group with the lowest turnout were voters who were between 18 to 24 years old. About 75,730 voters in that age group went to the polls on November 5.
