Volunteers at Headcount’s table at Bonnaroo 2026
The reasons people come to Bonnaroo typically involve seeing lots of live music and enjoying a party atmosphere. Chris Reed is also passionate about wanting Bonnaroovians to know that their vote counts, no matter where they live.
That’s why he and others are working the booth for nonpartisan, nonprofit organization HeadCount at Planet Roo in the middle of the festival grounds this weekend. As the organization has been doing at concerts and festivals since 2004, the crew at the booth registers voters and gives away free swag, and even looks up registration status for those who need to check it.
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Help with ensuring that your voter registration is up-to-date and confirming what congressional districts you vote in could prove crucial for Tennesseans because of the redistricting the state underwent in May. The state legislature convened for a special session after a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court limited the power of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. That decision opened the door for the Republican supermajority to reconfigure the maps despite having already redrawn them following the 2020 census. Republicans told the Scene they wanted Tennessee to have all nine districts in the state to go red in future elections.
“Our core mission is always to register folks, and now we have the ability to check voter registration status,” Reed explains of HeadCount. “When we came here in the beginning, this was pre-tech. Now that we have electronic activation options, that opens the doors more for us than were here when the festival started.”
Reed has been coming to Bonnaroo since 2012, and he has seen the ebb and flow of what people care about politically speaking. But Reed says as a nonpartisan nonprofit, his group champions the opportunity to explain what participation means in an American democracy.
Badges at the Headcount table at Bonnaroo 2026
“Coming out to festivals is where you meet a lot of people,” says Reed. “We meet folks that maybe were formerly incarcerated who didn’t know they got their rights back, or [newly eligible to vote] 18-year-olds. We meet a lot of people that say, ‘My vote doesn’t matter.’ But we try to emphasize that voting on every level matters, especially on the local level.”
Across the U.S. festival circuit, Reed notes, Bonnaroo is in the top five for new voter registrations made through HeadCount. The organization will be on the Farm all four days.
