Voter registration site sees surge in visitors after Harris-Trump debate, Taylor Swift endorsement

The end result is an raise in novel voters, for which Taylor Swift can take credit.

According to CNN, Vote.gov reported that Swift’s call to action and endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris drew 405,999 visitors to its federal voter registration website. The visitors did not translate into completed registrations, but the raise in interest was still significant.

This number is based on the number of fans who clicked directly on a link Swift posted in her Instagram Stories during the 24 hours the link was available. (Stories are only available for 24 hours unless they are archived as a Featured Story on the platform.)

A General Services Administration spokesman told CNN that this was a significant raise compared to typical web traffic patterns. Between September 3 and 9, the site had about 30,000 visitors per day.

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Vote.orgThe nonpartisan voting rights group also reported that as of Wednesday, 27,000 people had registered to vote after Swift’s tweet was published, and more than 80,000 people had confirmed their registrations on the site.

At the MTV Video Music Awards on Wednesday, Swift once again encouraged fans to register to vote while accepting the award for video of the year. Vote.gov At the time of publication, there is no post-VMA data.

This isn’t the first time Swift has attracted a huge number of novel voters. Last year, broke the record for kilometers traveled 35,000 people to Vote.org to register as novel voters. At the time, that meant the site most successful Voter Registration Day in three years.

The numbers reflect the pop star’s influence, often referred to as the “Taylor Swift effect.” It’s the same kind of boom that cities hope her Eras Tour will have on trade and tourism, and the loyalty that’s reflected in her appeal to fans when she releases novel music or merchandise. For that reason, the singer’s endorsement has been highly anticipated over the past few months.

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Swift has previously encouraged her fans to register to vote, but has avoided talking about politics for years. That changed in 2018, when she spoke out about the Tennessee congressional race for Democratic candidates.

Still, whether she supported a specific candidate this election cycle or not, devoted Swifties involved in politics used her fandom to campaign for Harris. When Swift expressed her support for Harris, the campaign quickly gained momentum, with Harris using Swift’s “The Man” as her campaign closing song and the campaign selling Swift-inspired friendship bracelets.