The sorority sisters gained access to the party through Hall, whose sister works for RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie. Other undergraduates captured their invites through internships, campaign work or family connections.
Marble wasn’t looking forward to her French and statistics midterms this morning, but she said attending the RNC event was worth an all-nighter.
As the night wore on, guests began wondering just how long they would be standing around. Some women removed their heels, others headed to the bar for another drink. Students chatted with one another, planning their own future political triumphs. “I’ll be your campaign manager, all right?” one student excitedly asked another.
“At Harvard it seems like being a Republican is evil,” said Elizabeth A. Sykes ’04, a Bush-Cheney campaign staffer and guest at the RNC event. “To come here, to be surrounded by so many people who believe in the President like I do…it’s refreshing, it’s so inspirational.”
GRAND OLD HEADACHE
Pending the results of the count in Ohio, the atmosphere in the Reagan building was more jaded than jubilant.
“Today’s been terrible,” sighed GW senior Lee Roupas, sipping a smoothie in between shifts at RNC headquarters, where he’s worked for the past two months.
Exit polls not looking good? Ballot fraud running rampant?
“I had midterms,” he explained.
Roupas, the chairman of the College Republicans in Washington, D.C., started Election Day at 6 a.m., driving from campus to the RNC building on Capitol Hill. A campaign event coordinator, he planned several budgets before racing back to GW for a presentation in his political communications class, followed by an afternoon finance midterm. At 5 p.m. he was back at the RNC for last-minute phonebanking.
“I’m looking forward to returning to being a regular college student,” he said.
Roupas’ experience mirrors that of hundreds of student volunteers across the country who have donated time, energy and—in some cases—GPAs to an election that observers say has sparked the highest level of youth political participation in decades.
“It’s a demographic that makes a difference, has opinions, cares about the war on terror, cares about jobs after we graduate,” Roupas said. “Truthfully it’s been our own fault for not voting. [But now] people are saying, ‘Hey, make your voice heard.’”
Roupas said yesterday afternoon that he was prepared for further weeks of campaign work in case the election results were disputed. An RNC-issued BlackBerry handheld was attached to his belt, ready to call him back into the political fray.
“I’m hoping to be able to give it back tomorrow, but if not we’ll wait and see,” he said.
—Staff writer Michael M. Grynbaum can be reached at grynbaum@fas.harvard.edu.