WTF Young America. The name says a lot about the frustration of the founder of a group trying to get young Americans out to vote.

Win The Future Young America was founded by L Henry Pratt — a former high school teacher who wanted to encourage young people to vote in any and every election, not just presidential elections.

Across America, only half of all eligible people under 30 voted at the last presidential election. Less than 20 per cent voted in last year’s mid-term elections, and that number plummets in state or local elections.

• Four wildcards who could become US president
• Jeb Bush dubbed a ‘terrible candidate’ after debate
• France to lift ban on gay men giving blood

So L Henry Pratt created the “Crawl for Democracy”, handing out wristbands offering discounted drinks to prospective young bar-crawling voters.

One year out from the US presidential vote, the initiative was on show at this week’s local elections in Virginia.

“In one of the districts we’re targeting here [in Virginia], they had a 13 per cent turnout in the 2011 election which was a state election, [and] in the 2012 presidential election they had 70 per cent turn out,” Mr Pratt said.

“We’re taking a different sort of tack.

“We want to turn election day into a celebration, something they can want to participate in just because it’s a fun event. We want to get them out celebrating.

“Something that is about a community coming together like we celebrate the 4th of July.

“We do a better job of celebrating the birth of our democracy, that occurred almost 240 years ago, than we do actually turning out on the day we practice democracy, which is election day.”

The WTF Young America team’s mission is hand out to wristbands to young people at voting booths, with the bands entitling their wearers to discounted drinks at local bars.

When asked if alcohol is a good motivator for young people, Mr Pratt replied: “We believe that it is”.

“I don’t want to emphasise too much the alcohol aspect of the bar crawl. There will be alcohol involved, we’re trying to change the culture of voting,” he said.

Clearly the concept was not attractive to one young politically engaged woman who seemed enthusiastic about participating right up until she heard what it involved.

“I don’t go to bars. Maybe you can organise it in a library next time,” the young Muslim woman said.

WTF Young America is not the first attempt to get young Americans politically energised. One example is the Rock the Vote campaign, which was founded in 1990 with the support of celebrities including Madonna.

But WTF Young America’s unique approach means it has to be careful, as giving inducements for voting is illegal.

“You’re not allowed to give any type of material reward in exchange for voting, that’s completely illegal,” Mr Pratt confirmed.

“We’re giving out wristbands to anybody who comes to ask for one; whether they are not registered, whether they haven’t voted in the last 10 elections, we don’t care about that.

“We’re interested in ensuring that people will come to get their bar crawl wristband and then they’ll decide to vote when the time comes.

“We want to give them an incentive to actually come to the polling station.”