Audience Analysis: An Analysis of Veteran Voters for the November 2022 Midterm Elections

Audience Analysis

Based on a national poll for the past 2016 Presidential election, while the majority of veterans who were aged under 34 to 54, were planning on voting for Joe Biden, the majority of veterans who were older than 54 were planning on voting for Donald Trump.

This indicates a relationship between age and political party when it comes to the voting population of veterans, and that younger veterans are more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate than a Republican one, and vice versa.

A 2020 Census Bureau Report suggests that the amount of woman voters is projected to dramatically increase in the next twenty years, and that the median age of veterans in 2018 was 68.
Some important political issues that may be important to veterans for these upcoming 2022 elections are veteran benefits, gun rights, national security, and military and defense policy.

Other issues surely will be important to veterans depending on their identity, but these are particular issues that seem relevant to the experiences that veterans face.

In July of 2022, 80% of the Senate Republicans blocked a bill (PACT Act) that would have helped veterans that are dangerously exposed to burn pits, and one Washington Post article noted how veterans responded outside of the Capitol Building: "Veterans — some in shirts emblazoned with the American flag and others wearing masks — held up signs. One read 'Sick and dying veterans need healthcare,' while another held the GOP responsible with the words 'Veterans blood is on Republican hands.'"
An NPR article noted that 1 in 5 of the defendants in the Jan. 6 Capitol Riot trials (a violent riot where people stormed the Capitol in anger at the results of the 2022 Presidential election) served in the military.
Veteran voters are an important voting population considering that based on a Census Bureau Report, 74.1% of veterans voted compared to 66.1% of non-veterans in the 2020 Presidential Election, thus it is likely that this statistic will be reflected in the 2022 Midterms and the proportion of veterans that will vote will be larger than the proportion of non-veterans that vote.

The two most popular candidates for the race of U.S. Senator for the state of Washington are Tiffany Smiley (R) and current senator Patty Murray (D).
Sen. Patty Murray's website explains how she is a daughter of a World War II era veteran and a senior member of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, and notes how she has fought for increased veteran benefits, housing benefits, and veteran clinics in the state of Washington.
Sen. Murray's site also claims that she particularly focused on assisting woman veterans and the unique struggles they face, as well as helping military families with paid parental leave.
Smiley's official website notes how Tiffany Smiley is married to an injured veteran who served in Iraq who she believed was mistreated due to government policies and is committed to helping veterans with disabilities.
A statement made by Smiley in a press release: “The crisis of veteran homelessness we are seeing on Washington streets is a tragedy. Our returning heroes deserve our undying gratitude and far more from our leaders than they are receiving. This epidemic must stop now and, as Washington’s next U.S. Senator, I will shine a bright spotlight on this crisis and I will work to build coalitions to enact a solution that helps those who have sacrificed so much for each and every one of us.”

I think that Audience Criticism is an effective form of rhetorical criticism particularly because it makes the assumption that the audience is, in many ways, the author based on how they respond to rhetoric.
I think that this allows for the audience to be spotlighted as a valuable part of the process of rhetoric, and how rather than simply the rhetor communicating the audience receiving the message, Audience Criticism considers feedback in the communication process
One aspect of Audience Criticism that I think limits it is that it is fairly general, so in the same way that the assumption of the audience as the author is effective, there is still something missing in not fully taking into account the literal rhetor who produces the rhetoric that the audience responds to.

Sources:

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2020/10/26/poll-trump-backed-by-majority-of-veterans-but-not-younger-ones/

https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/veterans-

report.html#:~:text=The%20number%20of%20veterans%20in,veterans%2C%20were%20women%20in%202018.