Voter Registration Will Be a Difference Maker in ’26

Democratic PACs and non-profits are facing two monumental challenges going into the 2026 midterms: voter registration and early redistricting. Many practitioners saw the headline earlier this year about the Democratic Party’s voter registration crisis. That stemmed, in part, from an underinvestment in voter registration efforts across two presidential cycles.

We want to reverse that trend, and offer proven, cost-effective tools and data modeling to do that effectively. 

If underinvestment in registration programs wasn’t bad enough, several key states are scrambling to redraw their congressional districts ahead of next year’s midterms. Non-profits and PACs supporting key races must ensure their target voters are registered correctly and subsequently turnout next November. Here are some ways PACs, groups and candidates can help ensure Democratic supporters are primed for 2026: 

The Right ROI

Voter registration programs are costly, especially if the money isn’t being spent efficiently. In 2024, Civitech ran local, state, and national programs to help the Rising American Electorate (young voters, folks of color, and the working class) get registered and show up at the polls. 

To help determine the best tools for registration and turnout programs, we ran randomized controlled trials (RCTs) across our campaigns to figure out which tactics actually made a difference. We found a way to maximize campaigns and groups’ return on investment (ROI) in their voter registration and GOTV programs. 

In total, our programs influenced over 630,000 votes. The cost was far below the industry average of $2,000+ per partisan vote. In fact, it cost only $162-309 per vote.

In a nutshell, our program works like this: we use our data models to score voters who aren’t currently registered, but would likely support a Democratic candidate.  

Then, depending on the state, they either receive a mailer package (CiviMail) with a pre-filled voter registration card and/or a postcard with QR codes, plus other instructions on how to get registered. The postcards are surprisingly effective, especially with young voters. Both packages come with information about their local Democratic candidates. 

We follow that up with a text chase. That’s the icing on the cake.

How To Put The Best Data To Use 

Thousands of first-time candidates will be running up and down the ballot in 2026. To set up these campaigns for success, we offer a tool called RunningMate, which helps campaigns and groups visualize their data targets in localized maps and dashboards. This is going to be helpful for finding unregistered voters and determining how to target them.

Now, sometimes our candidate, PAC or non-profit partners have their own data, which they can merge with our models. Typically, however, our clients come to us because they know we offer some of the most robust data sets in the entire industry. And our data is fresh. In fact, the new Texas congressional districts were just added to RunningMate last week.

There’ll likely be more district changes before the end of the year. California, for instance, votes on its new maps in November. Whatever happens, we’ll be ready to help our partners succeed. 

Interested in a free platform demo? Reach out here to schedule one today.

Ilia Valdes is a Marketing Coordinator at Civitech, a software company providing voter targeting solutions for progressive campaigns, groups, and nonprofits. Ethan Long is Civitech’s Senior Content Manager.