Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has been giving troops a day off to vote, but those votes may not help Republicans as much as Hegseth would like.

The secretary is urging service members to cast their ballots as he ramps up efforts to turn out the vote ahead of November’s midterm elections.

But historically low voter turnout among active-duty military members and frustrations over the war with Iran may put a damper on Hegseth’s hopes for how the military will vote —- if its members vote at all.

Earlier this month, Hegseth ordered a one-day “stand down” to all commanders to give their troops a day to vote in the U.S. elections.

“Every warrior deserves an opportunity to cast his or her ballot and be confident that it will be counted. Keep our nation the land of the free and the home of the brave,” Hegseth said in a video on X. “Get registered and vote.”Hegseth did not direct troops how to vote as he urged them to cast their ballots.

Military voters have largely been characterized as a constituency highly favorable to Republicans, but that isn’t necessarily the case, given how few service members actually cast ballots.

“Would he [Hegseth] do this if he thought that it was just about soldiers getting to vote and if he didn’t have some idea of which way they might go?” asked Jason Dempsey, an Army veteran and professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University who specializes in military demographics and civil-military relations. “He’s just not somebody who respects the normal processes and the independence of the military,” Dempsey said.

Support for Republicans might be lower than Hegseth hopes when low turnout combined with slim margins are taken into consideration.

“The key with the military is always, they come from the American public and so they bring the predispositions and proclivities towards politics that their fellow citizens do,” said Dempsey.

Dempsey says that demographics like race and gender are much more likely to influence a servicemember’s vote more than the fact that they are in the military, but he notes that senior officers have historically leaned toward voting Republican. Almost 20% of the military is Black, much higher than the American general population, and Dempsey notes that these servicemembers have been more likely to vote Democratic in the past.

This November’s elections come as service members are also raising a growing list of concerns about Hegseth’s and Trump’s leadership and directives, including the rise of Christian nationalism within the Pentagon, Trump’s use of the National Guard in cities across the U.S. and possibly illegal orders in military campaigns.

And as Trump and Hegseth continue to send troops to the Middle East on record-breaking deployments, the administration’s policies could become a motivating force for troops who might otherwise sit out the election.

“They want to follow leaders, and they want to do what they’re told, and they’re strong believers in defense and will go on deployments, but they just don’t believe that the leaders know what they’re doing,” said retired Navy Capt. Donald Inbody, author of “The Soldier Vote,” a history of how American service members gained the right to vote while serving away from home.

In March, the organization Blue Star Families reached out to about 200 military families and found that 81% reported elevated stress from the Middle East conflict, with 43% reporting “a great deal of stress,” driven by safety concerns, deployment changes and fear of escalation.

Hegseth’s stand-down day is another way to address a persistent challenge: getting troops to vote.

The nation’s 1.3 million active-duty military members have historically turned out to vote in lower numbers than civilians. Forty-three percent of active-duty service members cast a ballot in the 2024 general election, according to a report published by the Federal Voting Assistance Program. That’s compared with the 65% of all U.S. citizens who voted in 2024, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Plus, military service compounds a youth turnout problem.

Of about 1.32 million active-component members, 36.8% were under age 25, 60.3% were under 30, and 76.7% were under 35, according to Defense Health Agency data. Troops start from the baseline of young voters, a demographic with already low turnout.

The logistical challenges of casting an absentee ballot then push participation below what age alone would predict.

Experts say the timing of Hegseth’s stand-down directive leaves little time for service members to obtain, fill out and return their ballot in time for it to be counted.

Inbody said that service members needed to plan in advance to have their vote counted. Service members who didn’t request a ballot until the October stand-down face a tight round-trip by mail.

The Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment (MOVE) Act, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2009, requires states to send requested ballots for military and overseas voters by Sept. 19 — which was 45 days before the Nov. 3 election, Inbody said.

“You basically have to plan really far in advance to not only receive the ballot, but then also mail it in time to get it back,” Inbody said.

“The absentee ballot will probably get to them within a week. Then they need to fill the ballot out and get it back, and assume that maybe it takes two weeks for it to get back. So there, you’ve eaten up three weeks of your 45 days.”