MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
We've been talking with voters all week, and we are hearing their voices throughout the show.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Some say they're voting on abortion rights, including some students we met at the University of Pennsylvania here in Philadelphia. Darcy Elliot and Ixchel Ramirez are master's students, both from out of state. So both had a choice of whether to register to vote here.
DARCY ELLIOT: For me, moving to Pennsylvania, I was kind of excited because I felt like my vote was going to count a little more here. And so...
INSKEEP: You have registered here in Pennsylvania then.
ELLIOT: Yeah. The right to my body is super important, and I'm pro-choice. I also care about immigration. My past research and stuff has been in, like, immigration and refugees.
IXCHEL RAMIREZ: Moving here, I did switch because Pennsylvania is a swing state. And I think you see that, like, in the neighborhoods in terms of people showing who they're going to vote for.
MARTIN: Both are voting for Kamala Harris over abortion rights. That's an important issue to both of them. Our team also met a Penn student who comes from Arizona, so she made a choice, as students usually can, to vote in her home state. Abortion rights are on the ballot there, and she wants to vote for them.
INSKEEP: Republicans are emphasizing a different subject when it comes to social issues - transgender issues, which resonate with Donald Trump supporters like Ben Wallace, who is a fracking company manager we met in western Pennsylvania.
BEN WALLACE: I'm just going to say what I want to say. You know, fundamentally, I believe there's two genders. There's men and women. And I don't believe that young men should be bludgeoning young girls' and women's sports. And I think that is an example of where certain factions of the Democratic Party have become completely delusional.
MARTIN: There's some history here. Republican-led legislatures have passed laws about boys' and girls' sports or about gender-affirming care. Donald Trump spoke of protecting the LGBTQ community from violence back in 2016. But more recently, his campaign has spent millions on an ad on this issue. Based on our voter interviews, it's been very widely seen. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.