How 6 Million U.S. Expats Could Decide the 2024 Election

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Sneak Peek:

Kristin:    00:00:24    Have you ever threatened to leave your home country depending on who won an election? Well, if so, you're not alone. More than 30% of US citizens say that they would live abroad if they could more than double from 1995, and many of us already do. There are upwards of 9 million US citizens living abroad, and an estimated 6 million of them can vote in US elections. The problem is they don't. Why don't Americans vote from abroad? Why is it important and how can you vote in this year's election? Stay tuned to find out. 

Introduction: Welcome to the Traveling with Kristin Podcast, your destination for travel tips, living abroad, advice and insights that help you experience life in foreign cultures. If you're interested in slow travel, living abroad or a digital nomad lifestyle, you're in the right place. I'm your host, Kristin Wilson, the author of Digital Nomads for Dummies and the host of Traveling with Kristin on YouTube. Thank you for traveling with me today and let's see where our journey takes us.  

Kristin:    00:01:40    Hey there, Kristin Wilson here from Traveling with Kristin, and welcome to episode 271 of the Traveling with Kristin Podcast. We're coming to you a little bit late this week, actually, one week late. I have been having a little bit of personal emergencies, health, a family emergency, and also our dog was sick and almost died, so it was a very emotional time for me. I'm sure all of you pet parents out there can relate, but I am back now and something that's on a lot of people's mind lately has been the US elections, especially with the debates and well, pretty much just everything that happens every day. And if you are living abroad, then you've probably noticed that in expat Facebook groups and expat forums. There's a lot of talk about US politics, but what I've found in my career of helping people live abroad and creating content about it is that very few people are actually politically active despite how much they might talk about it online, consume the news, read about it, watch TV and YouTube videos.  

Kristin:    00:02:55    And so I wanna help change that in this podcast today. As I mentioned in the intro, 34% of Americans today say that they want to live abroad, although many of them feel held back for a variety of different reasons, but of the people who are living abroad, there's no exact number when it comes to US citizens abroad. There's a lot of different reasons for that. But official estimates say that upwards of 9 million US citizens live abroad, I think that number could be a lot higher because this number doesn't even include the number of active military and all also US government employees who are living abroad. That could add another 2 million people right there. Plus all of the people out there who are slow traveling, traveling part-time as flex pads like living in the US for a few months, living abroad for a few months, and all of the millions of self-proclaimed digital nomads, especially since 2020.  

Kristin:    00:04:05    Now, if we go by this number of 9 million people, that would make US citizens living abroad the 11th largest state in the country, but unofficially, we could be in the top five or definitely in the top 10. But what most people don't know is that you don't have to live abroad to be able to vote from abroad. You don't need a visa or a residency permit in another country. In fact, you can even vote abroad if you're on vacation. So why don't Americans abroad vote? Well, the main reason is that people don't know that they can, although now you do since you're listening to this podcast. So if you're a US citizen who's listening to this right now and you're in a different country and you don't know if you'll make it back to be able to vote in the November elections, then I want you to know that you can vote from abroad and you should.  

Kristin:    00:05:05    Despite how many millions of us are living overseas, as few as 3% of Americans abroad turn out to vote every year compared with 66% of people stateside. Now, 2020 had one of the highest voter turnouts in something like 120 years, so it's usually not that high, but either way, US citizens rarely make up more than three to 5% of the voter turnout despite being the 10th largest state in the country. In the last election, there was a slightly higher turnout, 7.8%, but that's still just a drop in the bucket when you think about how many people are actually living full-time or part-time overseas. Now, in one survey of thousands of US citizens living abroad, 31.5% said that they tried to vote but were unsuccessful. They got confused, or at some point during the process, they weren't able to complete their ballots. Another 40% of US citizens abroad said that they basically weren't interested.  

Kristin:    00:06:13    They didn't care to vote, and less than 8% actually voted. But if you're abroad, you might feel disconnected from the us, but your vote does matter. I mean, first of all, you have to file a tax return every year unless you've renounced your citizenship. So you might as well vote because you're getting taxed <laugh>. And the decisions and the politics that happen in the United States unfortunately affects everyone, almost everyone in the world, but especially US citizens living abroad. In fact, there are a lot of issues that I used to think of as just fixed that can actually be changed. One of the reasons is taxes. There's actually people from both sides of the aisle, Democrats and Republicans who are fighting to make it so that US citizens who are living abroad don't have to pay taxes or don't have to pay as much as if they were living in the country.  

Kristin:    00:07:13    So there's a lot of reform that could happen there. There's also some inconsistency with receiving your social security and pension overseas that we can actually change if we vote and if we get involved politically. Also, US citizens abroad can't receive Medicare, but why not? You might as well be able to. If you've been taxed your whole life and you're living overseas, you, you should still be able to keep it. At least that's my opinion. And so all of these things are issues that affect US citizens that are abroad, either part-time, full-time, temporary or permanently. But we can't change any of these issues unless we vote when US citizens don't vote, policies get passed. That can hurt us, especially when it comes to things like taxes and healthcare, and a lot of political candidates and a lot of lobbyists don't care about US citizens abroad because we're among the lowest donors of campaign contributions.  

Kristin:    00:08:14    So if we don't vote and we don't contribute any money to campaigns, then it's really hard to make a difference in the policies that really affect us as individuals. But the good news is, is that your vote does count if only 10% or 20%, or imagine if 50% of Americans abroad voted from overseas. That would have a huge impact in the elections. 66% of US citizens at home voted in the last election. So what if 66% of US citizens abroad voted just in 2020? Less than 1000 votes decided the presidential race in Georgia, and nearly 19,000 Georgia residents voted from abroad in 2000. It was even closer. Of course, we all remember what happened with the recount in Florida between George Bush and Al Gore, and it was actually delayed overseas ballots that tipped the scales in favor of George W by a margin of only 537 votes.  

Kristin:    00:09:25    So if you're one of the 40% of people who live abroad who don't think it's important for them to vote, then hopefully that this gives you some food for thought and makes you change your mind or at least see things differently and prompts you to do more research before you decide that you're just not going to vote. One of the main reasons that so many of us want to live abroad is for more freedom in a better quality of life, but when we don't vote from overseas, we are giving up some of those freedoms. So how do you vote from overseas? Well, voting as an American abroad is easier than ever. You can receive your ballot by email, fax, or PDF download depending on which state you last lived in, and you can also receive an absentee ballot by mail. You can go to vote.gov to find out how to register to vote from your state, and you can use your last known address and that state even if you don't live there anymore.  

Kristin:    00:10:28    So there's a big misconception that you either have to be in the United States to vote or that you have to have some kind of permanent address in the us. That is not the case. They're not going to send anything to your last known US address. You don't have to be there anymore. They just need to have some address on file. You can also connect with your local US embassy or consulate in your country. You can go to travel.state.gov to find your local consulate. You can also go to the FVAP website, the Federal Voting Assistance Program, that's F, V like Victor, a P like Paul, and I'll link to all of these resources in the show notes. The FVAP website has a really easy step-by-step, how to vote from a broad checklist on their homepage. And then regardless of which party you affiliate with, if you are a registered Democrat, you could go to Democrats abroad.  

Kristin:    00:11:29    Democrats abroad has been sending delegates to the Democratic National Convention and has been recognized as a state by the Democratic Party since 1964. So this is an official organization that can help support you not just with voting, but with other types of issues that that can face you as a US citizen living abroad from taxes to healthcare to L-G-B-T-I-A rights. And then there's also Republicans overseas, which isn't formally affiliated with the Republican Party like Democrats abroad, but you can still get some help from them with voting and also get involved in other issues that they're active on, such as tax reform. The last recommended day to vote from abroad is October 21st, so make sure to act now. If you're outside of the US I'll drop all of the links in this podcast description, and I would love to hear from you. Are you voting in this year's elections or will you be moving abroad based on the outcome of the elections?  

Kristin:    00:12:38    If you are seriously considering moving abroad for political or other reasons, I can help. We're getting close to the end of the year. So if 2025 is your year to go abroad, then apply for help from me at travelingwithKristin.com/relocation. Or you can just go to my website travelingwithKristin.com and click on relocation at the top. You can fill out a quick form and apply for a free call with me or my team. Either way, I hope that you share this episode because if 1000 of us listen to this and vote, that could swing the election right there. And what if 1000 people shared this with 1000 of their friends? We could end up swinging the elections in every single state across the country. So share with your friends on WhatsApp, share to Expat and Digital Nomad WhatsApp and Facebook group share on your social media.  

Kristin:    00:13:38    Let's help boost voter turnout from 7.8% to 10% and beyond this year, and make sure to make your voice heard either way. I wanted to make this episode short and sweet for you this week so that you can take this time to take action, and we'll be back soon with a lot of new episodes and new interviews with interesting people living around the world. I also want to thank all of my Patreon patrons for the support. We had a live Zoom call this week, and you can join my Patreon from only $5 per month at patreon.com/travelingwithKristin. I also want to thank everyone who has been leaving reviews lately and also buying me a coffee or tea on buying me a coffee. I really appreciate it. I read all of your reviews. Have a great week, and I'll see you back here next week for another new episode.  

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