Usually regarded as a fun, informal way to get kids involved in the presidential election, this year’s Nickelodeon Kids Pick the President “Kid’s Vote” event became the victim of fraud last week when bot-cheating was detected.
Kids Pick the President has been running for the last nine general election cycles, with the goal of familiarizing kids with the electoral process and allowing them to feel that their voice matters, despite not being of legal age to vote. The only rules in place for the event are that one vote is counted per device, so that households with multiple children could have each sibling vote individually.
Fraud was first detected when online forums began to appear on Wednesday, October 21, the day after the poll first opened. Almost 90,000 legitimate voters were deemed as “real” while a voter certification tool identified over 130,000 others as bots. Nick swiftly removed these votes, so that they would not count in the final results.
After the poll closed, it was found that Democratic Presidential candidate, Joseph R. Biden, received 53% of votes and the Republican candidate, Donald J. Trump, received the remaining 47%.
Biden’s win was then announced in a virtual TV special hosted by Keke Palmer on October 27. In addition to that, the special covered the basics of voting, looked at COVID-19 and its effect in this year’s election, and featured celebrity guests such as Skai Jackson and Maddy Ziegler.
Youth activists such as Zoë Jenkins of Lexington, Kentucky, founder of a DEI initiative; Mari Copeny (‘Little Miss Flint’) of Flint, Michigan, who is a young leader in spreading awareness of the water crisis in her city; and Jerome Foster II, who is the founder and executive director of an international youth organization called OneMillionOfUs, which seeks to get young people politically involved also spoke during the special about how to take a stand on important issues.
Throughout the course of its 36-year-run, the Kids Pick the President initiative has accurately reflected the results of the general election six out of eight times. With November 3rd, the actual date for the general election, rapidly approaching, it is to be determined if the prediction of these young voters will hold true again.
But above else, Kids Pick the President aims to educate and empower young people to be civically involved and informed. So if your 7-year-old cousin can “vote,” so can you! See you at the polls this Tuesday!