2025 Texas Voter Project — May 3 Results
1. Executive summary
425 San Antonians (ages 18-35) completed our post-election survey.
81 % rated the guide “Very” or “Extremely” useful.
92.7 % want the guide every election.
Helpfulness held across ideology:
79 % right-leaning
82.6 % moderate
85.9 % left-leaning
64.8 % “unsure”/no label
69.6 % had never received election info like this before.
“I wish the mayoral link had a graph or chart with a quick breakdown on major issues by candidate, and the issue they find most important” – female, leans liberal
“It doesn't really elaborate on anything to do with these candidates. I'd like information on what their platforms are, or at least a link to their social media or website.” – male, leans conservative
2. Why this really matters
Turnout cratered. May 3 turnout was < 10 % (only 5.8 % in early vote), so each informed ballot speaks for 10 others.
Young newcomers dominate growth. SA gains ~24 k people a year, most ~31-year-old renters/grads with zero local contacts.
Mobility kills voting. Moving slashes turnout 5-8 pts for years unless newcomers get trusted info.
Info desert confirmed. 69 % of our 425 qualified respondents had never seen a non-partisan guide before ours.
Five-alarm fire. Low-info newcomers + rock-bottom turnout = city policy set by a tiny, aging electorate.
State & national ripple. Plugging the gap in Bexar lifts 2026 statewide turnout and nudges Texas’ 40 EVs in 2028.
Cheap, scalable fix. One neutral digital guide costs pennies, travels anywhere Texas is booming, and seeds long-term voting habits.
Bottom line: San Antonio’s growth isn’t a civic win until its newest residents actually vote—and a simple, non-partisan guide is the fastest way to make that happen.
3. Methodology
We drew a random sample of 625 registered voters aged 18‑35 from Bexar County. Each person received one piece of outreach: a mobile‑first, interactive PDF voter guide about the May 2025 San Antonio mayor’s race. The guide was embedded directly in the email and packed with live links to trusted third‑party resources—like the Bexar County Elections portal—so readers could dive into polling‑place details, registration look‑ups, and candidate filings with a single tap. There were no follow‑up texts, postcards, or calls, so we could isolate the guide’s impact.
After reading, recipients landed on an embedded Qualtrics survey with eight substantive questions:
How useful was the guide?
Had they previously received similar non‑partisan information this cycle?
Was the content easy to understand?
Would it be helpful to get information like this for future elections?
Open‑ended: anything they didn’t like?
Attention‑check item (agree/disagree split) to weed out speed‑clickers.
Education level.
Political ideology.
Standard demographics (race, ethnicity, sex) were optional and collected only for internal crosstab analysis—not featured in headline numbers.
Out of a total 625 respondents 425 (68 % of the sample) completed the survey and confirmed they live inside San Antonio city limits.
4. Detailed findings
4.1 Usefulness distribution
Key takeaway: 81 % rated the guide “Very” or “Extremely” useful.
4.2 Demand for future guides
Key takeaway: 92.7 % want the guide every election.
4.3 First-time exposure
Key takeaway: Nearly 70 % had never seen a non-partisan voter guide before, during early voting, underscoring the information gap our project fills.
4.4 Cross-ideological appeal
Key takeaway: rated as extremely/very useful across the ideological spectrum.
4.5 What voters want next
Out of 108 open-ended comments, nearly half (42 %) simply said the guide was great as-is, while about a third (35 %) asked for more detail—typically longer candidate bios or deeper issue links. The remaining 23 % fell into an “other” grab-bag of notes (everything from typos to “please make a dark-mode PDF”). In other words, most young readers either loved the guide outright or wanted the very thing we’re planning next: richer drill-down content—good news for iteration.
5. Interpreting the numbers
Information deserts are real. Seven in ten young voters lack basic election info until it’s handed to them.
Non-partisanship wins trust. Uptake was high even among voters who normally avoid “political” content.
Low turnout amplifies impact. In a sub-10 % election, shifting just a few thousand young voters could alter outcomes.
6. What’s next — June 7 Runoff Guide 2.0
Voters asked for side-by-side candidate snapshots, so we’re sprinting to deliver:
Cost: Research, fact-check, bilingual design $5,000 + survey $8 per voter
Early voting: May 27 – June 3
Funding deadline: May 27 (to hit inboxes on time)
7. How you can help
Every $80 gets the upgraded guide and a reminder text to 10 under-35 voters.
Every $5,000 covers full production.
www.TexasVoterProject.org/runoff
Questions about the data? Want the raw anonymized dataset?
Email sophia@texasvoterproject.org and we’ll gladly share.
