Rutgers study: Disabled are 'neglected' voting bloc

• According to a Rutgers study, there are more than 35 million voters with disabilities, more than African American or Hispanic voters.
• Despite 62 million people with or living with someone with a disability, campaigns largely ignore them as a voting bloc.
• Voters with disabilities still face obstacles at polling places.

NEW BRUNSWICK - Voters with disabilities outnumber minority groups and could prove a powerful voting bloc -- if they're ever given easy access to polling places on Election Day.

According to a new report from the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations, about 35.4 million disabled people will be eligible to vote in the November 2016 election, a larger group than African American or Hispanic voters.

It represents an increase of nearly 11 percent since 2008, a higher rate of growth than among voters without disabilities.

MORE: Disabled people denied voting rights, group says

The trick is turning those eligible voters into likely voters, Rutgers professor Douglas Kruse said. According to the report, only 46 percent of eligible disabled voters are projected to actually cast a vote.

“Over the last century, people with disabilities have not been part of mainstream life, in general," said Kruse, a co-author of the report. "The relative neglect of people with disabilities just stems from that lingering social exclusion. They haven’t fully incorporated them into social life and political life.”

It comes down to obstacles faced at the polls, Kruse said. For example, more than 20.1 eligible voters are expected to have a mobility impairment likely requiring a handicap ramp to enter the building. An expected 6.3 million will have a visual impairment, requiring assistance in the ballot booth.

MORE: Advocates emphasize access for voters with disabilities

Often, that assistance isn't available. In 2012, about 30 percent of voters with disabilities reported facing an obstacle to voting. Only 8 percent of other voters reported an obstacle.

“By not having accessible polling places, that sends a message to people with disabilities that they’re not expected or welcome to vote,” said Rutgers professor Lisa Schur, a co-author of the report.

The easiest way is to make it easier to vote by mail, Schur said. In the three states where all voters cast ballots by mail, a higher percentage of disabled voters cast a ballot, she said.

But it goes beyond simple election accessibility:  Including those living with a person with a disability, it's a voting bloc of 62 million people that has gone largely ignored by candidates, campaigns and "get out the vote" volunteers," Kruse said.

MORE: ADA needs more work

That political incorporation comes with voter turnout or by "disabilities" becoming a hot-button ballot issue, which Kruse hasn't seen since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990.

That may change this year, Schur said. While voters with disabilities are strongly interested in a greater government role in health care and job creation, the behavior of Republican nominee Donald Trump could be an extra motivator.

In November, Trump openly mocked a New York Times reporter's disability at a campaign rally in South Carolina.

"It gets people angry," Schur said.

Mike Davis: 732-643-4223; mdavis@gannettnj.com