America suffers from disturbingly low voter registration and turnout rates. Almost 50 million eligible people were not even registered to vote in the 2012 election, and another 12 million had problems with their registration that kept them from voting. What’s more, many of these millions were low-income, youth, and people of color, all of whom are less likely to be registered. In order to strengthen our democracy, the United States must take dramatic and innovative steps to remedy our anemic voter turnout and registration.

“By the People: Promoting Democratic Participation through Comprehensive Voter Registration,” identifies Automatic Voter Registration (AVR) as the critical transformative policy that can result in the registration of millions of new voters. By shifting the responsibility of voter registration from the individual to the government, AVR ensures a more robust democracy. Automatic Voter Registration should be part of a suite of reforms including pre-registration of 16- and 17- year olds, portable registration, and other policies that make election administration more efficient.